


The Cat Among the Elves

by Lepidopteran (inarticulate)



Series: Rúnyo [1]
Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Animal Transformation, Canonical Character Death, Death is Not Permanent, Depression, Forgiveness, Half-Cousin Incest, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Mortality, Rebirth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-01
Updated: 2014-09-03
Packaged: 2018-02-11 08:53:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 28,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2061834
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inarticulate/pseuds/Lepidopteran
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Maitimo, as all the sons of Fëanáro, is not so easily forgiven.  As his brothers are slowly reembodied after the end of the Third Age, Maitimo is given a different fate: his soul is placed in the mortal body of a cat.  Unable to speak and trapped in a body foreign to him, Maitimo slowly begins to reconnect with his family— especially his beloved cousin Findekáno.</p><p>Archive warnings are in the endnotes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [Кот среди эльфов](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12699711) by [rio_abajo_rio](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rio_abajo_rio/pseuds/rio_abajo_rio)



> Two things:
> 
> 1) Even edited, I'm afraid this probably contains a mix of American and British spelling. I apologize in advance; I had a very confused literary childhood, and both spellings look correct to my eyes.
> 
> 2) This is a mix of The Silmarillion canon and various other sources. Therefore, Findekáno is not married and Ambarto died in the burning of the ships.

By the Fourth Age, most of the Elves that Maitimo had known in life were long reembodied. Time for the fëa passed not the same as for the hröa; without the concerns of a body that needs to eat and sleep, that measures the time in days spent in sunlight and the feeling of green grass against bare feet, time became meaningless. Maitimo could not have said how long the Second and Third Ages were, nor whether they passed fast or slow. He knew only the Halls and his own wandering of them.

Ambarussa the younger had long been reembodied by the time Maitimo's fëa appeared in the Halls, but Ambarussa the elder had lingered there with the others until that moment in the Fourth Age when Maitimo realised his absence. Ambarussa had left without so much as a farewell. Then again, Maitimo thought, it was just as well. What could he have said? _I will see you again_ was a promise for fëa who left themselves unmarred by sins committed in life. Fëanor's line remained cursed by their own design; Fëanor himself had been in a corner of the Halls since his death and remained there even now, his fëa hot enough that Maitimo could feel it even without the nerves under his hröa's skin.

Maitimo stayed anyway, as long as he could force himself to remain. It was his duty as the eldest son, and he had enough experience with heat, besides. If he felt sometimes that Fëanor's anger threatened to melt what remained of Maitimo's self, it was only his due.

Canistir was the next to leave, to Maitimo's surprise. Maitimo thought it might have been Makalaurë, who had appeared in the Third Age as a shadow of his former self. He had not spoken to Maitimo even now; Maitimo only knew of his presence by the occasional glimpse of that tattered, nigh-unrecognizable fëa slipping out of crowds. Makalaurë had no more of music in his fëa, and that he suffered so was Maitimo's doing. Perhaps if he had listened to Makalaurë instead, they would indeed have been forgiven, and Maitimo and Makalaurë both would be re-embodied. Perhaps Maitimo would have been able to hope to see Findekáno again, to touch him again. Maitimo ached sometimes with the thought.

But as the events had happened, his aches were for naught. He had been telling himself so for these two Ages. Hope only brought more despair. It was the hope that he could eventually rejoin Findekáno that had lead to the attack on the people of Doriath, innocents all, that deed which had sealed his already-doomed fate.

It had been despair over that which had lead to Maitimo's final words of desperation, which had doomed Makalaurë to this shadow he had become.

But Carnistir's reembodiment? Carnistir had always been prone to violence and anger. It should have been Makalaurë, Maitimo thought, his whole fëa aching. Makalaurë deserved to know the touch of the harp's strings against his fingers once more. He had learned to love even in the depths of sin, had given himself to the care of Elrond and Elros when Maitimo could not. He had looked after the crumbling husk of Maitimo's body and mind. His final sin had been kindness to an already-destroyed Elf, and that had doomed him in the end.

Maitimo felt as though a breath he could not have been holding let out when Makalaurë did indeed vanish from the Halls. He found himself staying away from Fëanáro after that, as though the absence of Makalaurë had freed him. Maitimo found himself staying close to Lómion, instead. Lómion did not welcome Maitimo's sudden attention, preferring to keep to himself, but Maitimo could not help the thought that Lómion was the closest he could come to Findekáno, and that he owed it to the son of Findekáno's sister to at least keep an eye on him. So though they did not speak, Maitimo watched Lómion as he moved through and away from the other fëa, until he saw Lómion no more.

It was unfair of Maitimo to consider himself alone in this time, for he had Fëanáro, his father, and Tyelkormo and Curufinwë remained by Fëanáro's side along with Finwë himself. But it seemed now that every time he moved too close to them, he could hear their voices again assuring him that should they succeed in recovering the Silmarils, Maitimo and Findekáno would be reunited once more. This, too, was unfair of him; for it was his own weakness that had caused this argument to take root and poison the rest of his mind. He knew full well that he had been weakening since Findekáno's death, as though all that had been holding him in place after Thangorodrim had crumbled in his beloved cousin's absence from the world of the living.

And so, though he knew it unjust, he hurt as he saw them accept their own faults and make peace with themselves and their deeds, while Maitimo stayed hollow and grieving, untouched by the healing of Nienna's tears.

Perhaps it would have been easier to draw anger inside him instead, but Maitimo had spent too much time near his father's burning rage, and Maitimo wished none of it. He did not allow himself to feel anger beyond the hurt that cut into him: all there was to be angry about was caused by his own misdeeds, and it would accomplish nothing to blame others. And so it was; he accepted that he would remain here, and outside Findekáno would live on, and perhaps that was for the better, that he could not lead his beloved cousin into danger once more. Here, in the Halls of Mandos, Maitimo could not let his arrogance undo all he cared about.

If his remaining brothers and father noticed his fading, which should not happen in the Halls of Mandos, they did not say so. Maitimo thought his grandfather did notice, but it was a passing kind of notice and swiftly forgotten. Maitimo did not begrudge him this; Fëanáro's healing, Finwë once said, would take a long time. Too much fire had Míriel put into his spirit, that he had been made strong and sure of will ere Morgoth had tainted it with whispered lies and jealous rumors past any easy redemption.

Maitimo took to wandering the Halls alone, summoning the memory of fire eating into his flesh. He knew torture well, and he inflicted it carefully on himself in a way the Valar had not, in the hopes that he could burn off the worst of himself. He could not undo all his misdeeds; he could only do this small penance.

He knew not how long he had been doing this before Námo appeared before him, tall and terrible to the eyes of the fëa in a way he had not been when both Elf and Valar possessed bodies. Here, Námo was not a body; he was a presence that filled a room, inescapable. Maitimo had no words to describe Námo, not old nor new. When he spoke, Maitimo's entire fëa quaked with it.

"You do yourself harm in these halls, son of Fëanáro," Námo said, "but there is no forgiveness for you. You cannot be reembodied."

Maitimo felt each word like a blow, and he bowed to it as he had never bowed to any pain in life. "I know," he said finally, for those were the only words he could summon. Námo had not spoken to him before this. Námo had looked at Maitimo upon his arrival in the Halls of Mandos, but he had said nothing, and he had left Maitimo alone after that. Maitimo imagined that Námo felt scorn or hatred for all the sons of Fëanáro, for their foolish oath and the sins they had committed. He had not expected this.

"Would you go to your brothers if you could?"

Maitimo looked down at the grey floors. He could not escape the Lord of these Halls, and to do so would be cowardly, besides. "I would not have my presence be a burden," he said. He had accepted his fate long ago; to hear of it now should be no great trial. "I know what it is that I have done, in my selfish desire, and that it has been so much of my life that I could not have done it differently. There is no forgiveness for such as me."

Námo's silence was as much as a weight as his words. When he spoke again, his voice had softened, though hearing it was no easier. "You would not return for your brothers, but for another."

"I would not burden my beloved friend," Maitimo repeated.

Námo's presence formed a shadowy hand that reached out, and Maitimo felt his fëa yielding to it. "You do yourself harm here, yet you cannot truly be reembodied without forgiveness," he said. "Thus it will be that your fëa will find itself in a container demeaning to it; you will be mortal, and you will die once more, but perhaps you will find in this brief time the answers which you do not find here."

Maitimo wanted to speak, to protest, to question, but Námo's power was too great, and he found his awareness of the Halls slipping beyond his grasp.

* * *

Maitimo's awareness returned with the smell of the forest heavy in his nose and the sounds of birds in his ears. He had expected, from Námo's words, to find himself in the body of a Man, but a Man in Valinor would be suspicious, and the more he thought about it, the less he believed they would have found method to transport him all the way back to the land where Men still dwelt. The thought had been a foolish one.

After all, most of his mistakes had been made there, and the Valar had been watching the entire time.

Maitimo's new body, he discovered, was four-legged, and after the initial moment of panic when Maitimo tried to push himself upright and succeeded only for a brief moment before crashing down to the ground again, he forced himself to think about it logically. He had a tail, which he could feel lashing behind him. His attempts to control it, however, did not work, and it would not still. He had fur, which he could feel when he moved, which meant he was no lizard. Most likely, then, he was a cat or a dog, judging from the size of the world as he looked out at it. Colors now seemed faded, compared to how he had seen the world before.

He opened his mouth to make a noise and heard a wobbly sort of meow. A cat, then.

He lay there in the dirt, trying to calm his mind. He could feel the disconnect between fëa and hröa, and it hurt, as though he were being tugged in two directions. These were not _his_ paws. The twitching thing behind him was not _his_ tail. And yet they were, and he could feel his own panic-fast breaths.

But there were no orcs, and his flesh was not burning. Maitimo lay there and the pain eased rather than growing worse. His breath began to quiet, and he became aware of a new problem: he was hungry, and he had not arrived in the newborn body of a babe with a mother to suckle from. It had been Ages since he had eaten, and now he was in this body which could not tolerate what greens he might scavenge, could not use words to beg a meal from another's pot. This body could hunt, except that Maitimo had no experience in a cat's ways of it.

He stayed there on his side, twisted oddly around himself, and his tail eventually stilled as an unfamiliar lapse of consciousness came upon him.

Maitimo woke again with a start to a warm hand settled light over his ribs and no memory of that large hand being set there. "What do you suppose is wrong with him, then?" a quiet voice asked, and it tugged at the corners of Maitimo's memory.

"I know not, my love," said a voice that Maitimo _did_ recognize as his cousin Findaráto. He tensed, relaxed as the hand skated over his fur, then tensed again. "But I see in your eyes that you mean to save this poor creature, and I will help if I can."

The hand moved over him again, and Maitimo opened one eye to see an Elf he had once known. Amarië, he thought her name was. She had settled over him, her brows furrowed in an expression of concern as she looked down at him. He tried to move, just once, but weakness had spread through his unfamiliar limbs, and he could not make them move right. Amarië's mouth twisted down. "Shh, calm yourself," she soothed. "I mean you no harm."

She should, if she knew who he was in truth. Maitimo had no doubts as to where his cousin's loyalties would fall, and there was no way Findaráto had not heard of Maitimo's actions by now. Those Maitimo had slaughtered were long since reembodied, as were his brothers. He tried to make a sound— to explain this, perhaps— and disoriented and dizzy as he was, he forgot that the only sounds he was capable of making were the pathetic noises of a distressed cat.

Amarië scooped him into her arms, cradling him as though he were a precious infant. Maitimo froze, then struggled briefly, but Amarië's arms held him with surprising strength. Or perhaps, he realised, his new size made him weaker. "It's all right, it's all right," Amarië soothed in melodic tones, a litany of nonsensical reassurances.

Maitimo gave up and sagged in her grip only to feel an unwelcome sensation of warmth and comfort. As long as it had been since he'd last eaten, it had been longer since he had held this way. Findekáno had been the last, with Maitimo's hand newly gone and the memories of Thangorodrim still lurking in every moment Maitimo spent with his eyes closed. He had worked until exhaustion took him, and Findekáno had followed unbidden, curling around him. Maitimo had never asked for it, but it seemed as much for Findekáno's comfort as his. There had been embraces since, all from his brothers, but nothing this tender and long-lasting.

He wondered now if anyone had held Findekáno like that, in the wake of Nolofinwë's death, since Maitimo had not been around to see to his beloved cousin's comfort. He hoped there had been, though the thought made his fëa ache with a more familiar kind of longing.

Amarië carried him with a graceful, fluid pace, but Maitimo must have fallen unconscious before her destination was reached, for the next thing he became aware of was the sensation of a cool wet cloth being placed against the side of his mouth and the smell of something that his new hröa identified immediately as food. He opened his mouth to draw in the cloth and suckle from it as though he were an infant, until enough strength had returned that he could roll upright and drink on his own from a small ceramic bowl. The method of drinking was a strange movement of the tongue that drew water up into his mouth, and Maitimo found the only way to perform it successfully was to draw his fëa back and let the tongue move on instinct alone. In this manner, he drank his fill before being presented with a well-sliced and very raw fish, which Maitimo needed to draw his fëa back from for another reason altogether. But eventually his belly filled, and he found himself flopping over on his side again.

"What a good boy," Amarië cooed. Her fingers stroked down his ribs, and Maitimo found himself suddenly convinced that despite her kindness, he needed to flee as soon as his strength returned and his new limbs worked. He could not bear the new guilt of depriving her of the company of an animal she had grown attached to, and he could not very well stay in what he assumed to be Findaráto's home. He would need to figure out some method of living self-sufficiently.

* * *

The next few days he spent regaining his strength, sleeping a truly ridiculous amount, and learning to trust his new hröa to do the simplest of tasks that his fëa could not believe possible. He had to draw back simply to walk on all fours, for the moment he became conscious of the rhythm of four legs rather than the two he expected, he would trip and find himself in a pile of limbs upon the floor. But should he trust his instincts, he found he was capable of great feats, such as leaps many times the height of his own body, that he would not have been able to accomplish before. He feasted each day upon raw fish and ceased his wariness of the uncooked state of it.

Upon the fourth day, or perhaps the fifth, for he had never needed to track the days before, a mouse came before him. His hröa pulled him up and into the hunt before his fëa could think upon it. It had been long since his last hunt, and though this body and style of hunt were new, the joy of it was not. Upon the hunt's conclusion, he settled back into himself and looked down at the mouse's body, surprised to find that he could still take joy in something. He should not waste it, he decided, for he could leave it to nourish the land but he could also test how well it would nourish his belly. He could not be self-sufficient if he did not have a means of providing food for himself. So he leaned forward and held the body still with one paw while he ripped the skin with his sharp teeth.

The affair was a messy one, though Maitimo found the taste of hot blood on his tongue delicious. Amarië came in when Maitimo had his nose still pressed into the partially excavated corpse, with blood forming a trail as Maitimo's attempts at eating had moved the corpse along an abstract path. "Oh, no," she said, and her voice was heavy. "What am I to do with this?"

Maitimo sat up instantly, his heart clenching at the tone of her words. He licked at his mouth and nose, conscious that there must be blood in his fur. Then he licked at his paws, for he felt filthy all over and had no other means to remedy this but to apply his hröa's instincts to this purpose.

"There _is_ a bowl provided to you for the purpose of meals," Amarië continued, but her words were resigned, as though speaking to an animal. She was, after all.

Findaráto followed shortly and laughed at the mess in his carefree manner. He picked up the mouse's remains with ease, not even bothering to cover his fingers, and deposited them in the bowl. Maitimo could not look at the body without shame, though, and as the corpse grew ripe over the next few hours, Findaráto moved it again to bury it carefully in the soil.

This was the moment Maitimo chose to run away.

He slipped out to the sound of Amarië singing in another room and the scrape of Findaráto's spade against dirt, and he lost them both as he darted out into the wilderness. The controlled growth of Valinor could not compare to the untamed danger of Beleriand, but Maitimo avoided the deep woods behind him nonetheless, and ran down a well-worn dirt pathway instead. There were forests ahead of him, too, but they held no association of a newly embodied cat slowly sinking into starvation. Instead, he remembered exploring with his cousins and his brothers, teaching them to hunt, riding and singing and learning far more than he ever had in the walls of any city.

Still, in this small body, even these forests were a danger to him. He could no longer pursue deer; instead he needed to avoid them, lest he be trampled to death by the weight of beasts much larger than himself. He slept uneasy in whatever shelter he could find. He climbed a tree after some days, meaning to get some sense of where he was, but realised then that he had no easy way down. He climbed down backwards, but he could not see where he was going and fell a ways to the bottom. He twisted in midair and caught himself upon his legs, but the sensation left him dazed, and it was in this state that he first heard the call.

"Here, kitty! To me, kitty! Would you not have some fish, if you are not slaughtering innocent mice in the home of your benefactors?"

"Findekáno," Findaráto said, with some exasperation. "You make a mockery of this."

Findekáno laughed, and Maitimo felt every muscle in his body turn to liquid. He could not weep in this body, but if he had been able to, he would have, purely to release the emotion that swelled within him at the sound. "You cannot see the humor in this, cousin? I do not know what Amarië expected when she took in a cat. Has she not known the beasts before? At least he did not expel his meal into her bed before he left."

"She did not expect him to escape, for he has no reason to run," Findaráto said. "We have given him food and seen him grow stronger, but I do not believe he will survive for long on his own. He has little control over his own limbs and frequently trips over himself. I believe he has been damaged in some way; the mouse he caught is a fluke."

"You have such faith in this animal," Findekáno said. "Has he captured your ladylove's heart so swiftly?"

"She has little fondness for cats." Findaráto sighed. "But her heart is lost to any in need, and she would not leave him to die out here. Were it not for the child coming swift to term within her belly, I have no doubt that she would be out here searching for this cat herself."

Amarië was pregnant? Maitimo blinked; he had not even noticed.

"And instead you trap your cousin with promises of a hunt." Findekáno's voice held a warm amusement that Maitimo found he had sorely missed. He wobbled forward on suddenly unsteady paws, desperate to hear more of it; for he had long ago resigned himself to never hearing it again, and it now fell upon him like a soothing rain. "I had expected to bring down a fierce beast!"

"I do not know why I invited you along."

"Because it has been so long since we have seen each other, and you wished to gaze upon my face and be in my company once more? Or perhaps you knew I would find greater joy in the outdoors than staying at home with your wife while you hunted alone." Findekáno's words were light, but once the haze of simply _hearing him_ passed, Maitimo could sense and undercurrent of something else in his tone. He knew not what it was. He wobbled a few steps closer before forcing himself to stop; he could not give away his position simply because Findaráto had employed Findekáno to assist him. Maitimo would not break so easily. Not now. Not when he would simply be taken back to Findaráto and Amarië's home, not when they were apparently with child. Maitimo could not live with the reminder of all he had done.

"Come here, kitty!" Findekáno called again. He sounded closer this time. Maitimo closed his eyes, flattened himself against the ground, and gave in to the will of the Valar. As he did so, he heard the crunch of approaching steps and Findekáno's voice breathing out a soft sound. "Oh. I believe I have found him, cousin."

Maitimo didn't look up. He didn't dare breathe.

"Are you hurt, little one?" Findekáno murmured, and his voice was so gentle that Maitimo nearly cried from it. Findekáno's fingers whispered against his fur in a soft caress, and Maitimo had to shove jerkily to his feet with a frantic mew. Findekáno pulled his hand back. "I am sorry, I did not mean to scare you— What?" For Maitimo could not bear the sight of his beloved cousin so uncertain when he had always been so strong, so confident, so hopeful even in the most trying of times. He walked forward, and, without choosing to, he found the flat of his head bumping against Findekáno's shin as he crouched there among the fallen leaves.

"So you have," Findaráto said, as though from very far away. "And I believe he likes you better than he does us." Maitimo felt something in the small body he inhabited start to vibrate as Findekáno's fingers touched him again. A purr; he had forgotten this sound cats made, and he had never known how comforting it was. He relaxed into it and found his whole hröa arching up towards Findekáno's hand each time it left Maitimo's fur.

"He's lovely," said Findekáno, with a familiar tone of wistful longing that Maitimo wished he didn't recognize. _You get attached too easily,_ he wanted to say, but all that came out was another throaty meow, this time jarred by the rhythm of the purrs that shook his body.

Findaráto stayed quiet for a long moment before he laughed. "Well, I am sure Amarië would have no problems with passing him off into your capable hands. You do need something to keep you out of trouble."

Keep him out of trouble, was it? Maitimo wished he had been able to do that. If Findekáno had not been stroking under his chin, he might have fled at those words; instead, he found himself shoving his paws into the leaf litter in a rhythmic motion, contentment flooding through him. He barely noticed when Findaráto reached out as well, but when he did, he shied away to bump into Findekáno's leg and rest there.

"He does seem to like me better," Findekáno said, his voice soft. He sounded amazed, though his words were undoubtedly intended as a light-hearted tease.

"You see?" Findaráto sounded amused rather than upset. Maitimo closed his eyes and tried not to think about all the ways he had upset his own plans.

* * *

Maitimo stayed utterly limp in Findekáno's arms for the ensuing discussion about his future. He breathed Findekáno's familiar scent and let an occasional tired purr rumble through him. He did not allow himself to think of anything else, not even the words passing over his head. He dozed that way, his nose tucked into the crook of Findekáno's elbow, and he only woke upon hearing Nolofinwë's voice.

"You bring a cat into this house?" Maitimo tensed, expecting anger, but Nolofinwë's voice held only amusement. "And here I believed you were going to visit your cousin."

"I did, only to find he had lost his cat. We went searching, and found this cat upon the road, near Tirion. He is to be my cat, now." Findekáno stroked the top of Maitimo's head with one finger. "I am going to call him Yaulo."

Maitimo made an indignant noise and batted at Findekáno's arm. Did Findekáno have _no_ naming sense?

Fortunately, Nolofinwë, too, seemed disgusted by the simplicity. "If the cat is truly yours, you cannot simply call him by what he is. You know that well. Think upon a better name for him, and I will welcome him into my household."

"Yes, father," Findekáno sighed as Maitimo stiffened. _You would not welcome me if you knew who I was,_ he thought bleakly. _You know well that I lead him to his death, and what I have done beyond that. How weak I am to rely upon him still!_

He found himself jarred from his thoughts by Findekáno's gait as he moved through the house. Findekáno's rooms, fortunately, were large and quiet, empty save for Findekáno and Maitimo and the gentle breeze from outside. "In truth," he said as though sharing a secret, "I thought to name you Rúnyo, for your fur is the color of flame. I am not one given to the naming of things, but it is a great sight better than Yaulo, is it not? But my father is so quiet these days."

As he spoke the name, Maitimo could almost hear his cousin's mouth forming around a more familiar epessë instead. The name was so close, yet still so far. But it was indeed better than Yaulo. Maitimo sighed and flopped down where Findekáno set him, and Findekáno laughed softly.

"I know not why you have chosen me, but I am glad you did," he said, but he spoke no more, and Maitimo had not the words to persuade him. Instead, under Findekáno's skillfull hands, Maitimo soon fell asleep again.

* * *

Findekáno had left by the time Maitimo awoke the next morning. He attempted to quell the ache in his heart at that, for the sun spilled light into the room at an angle which indicated the time to be well past morning, and of course Findekáno would not change his routine for a mere cat. And it was for the best that he did not. Maitimo instead practised his walking and jumping as he had in the home of Amarië and Findaráto. He had not meant to attract anyone's attention, but he must have, for Irissë stepped inside.

Irissë had never been close to Maitimo, preferring the raucous company of the brothers Maitimo sought most to avoid, but he had spent some time with her in Valinor, all those Ages ago. He had also looked out for her son in the Halls of Mandos, and it was for that reason Maitimo found himself freezing up unexpectedly.

"A _cat_?" Irissë murmured, her tone just shy of derisive. "That's what's been making this noise?" But she crouched and held out her hand as though he were a hound, and Maitimo let his wariness fade as he stepped forward to sniff delicately at her fingertips. She smelled faintly of dog herself; not in an unpleasant way, but as though she had been out hunting. Likely she had; she had always enjoyed the company of Huan on hunts, Maitimo recalled. He withdrew to a safe distance, out of petting range, and she rocked back on her heels.

Like this, he could not ask the questions he wished to, such as why she and Findekáno stayed in the house of their father, when one such as Findekáno who had once been High King should have had his own house with many smiling faces, when Irissë herself was a woman grown and long married. But, Maitimo thought, recalling Ëol and how Lómion's fëa had shied from him, perhaps that was _why_ she stayed in Nolofinwë's house.

"And that is where the smell of fish is coming from, too," Irissë sighed as she stood. She nudged a bowl Maitimo hadn't seen with the tip of her toe. "Can you not hunt, cat? Is that why my brother feels the need to coddle you?" She considered him for a moment, then, with surprising speed, reached out to pick him up.

Maitimo froze, then struggled, but he could not use all his strength to fight against her for fear he would scratch or otherwise harm her when he had no desire to do so. Irissë carried him a distance down some stairs, to what appeared to be a storeroom, and set him down. "If you are to stay in this house, you should make yourself useful," she said. "There are mice here that you may eat should you catch them."

Maitimo's eyes adjusted swiftly to the dimmer light, in time to catch Irissë's fierce grin. He recalled her love of the hunt and heaved a heavy sigh. He would do as she said; he did indeed owe the family of Nolofinwë his very life, and he had not any other means to repay his debt in this small and fragile body. Irissë left, and Maitimo did spend some time hunting mice. He did not have as much luck as his first hunt; the first mouse escaped unharmed. But the second he devoured hungrily on the very spot he had killed it before recalling Amarië's shocked expression and realizing with a sinking heart that it was too late for any one cat to be able to clean the mess he had yet again made.

He rested, then, and caught and ate a second mouse, though this one he brought out of the storeroom and into a secluded corner on the outside of the house where the blood would not cause so much stain. This, of course, was how Findekáno found him, licking his paws clean. Findekáno's face was drawn with worry, and the instant Maitimo saw him he scrambled to his feet with a desperate meow. But Findekáno smiled shakily and then knelt and gathered Maitimo in his arms, heedless of the blood. "There you are," he murmured. "When Irissë told me she had removed you from my rooms I feared you would be lost again. But I see you are only hunting, my Rúnyo."

Maitimo resisted only a moment before rubbing his face against Findekáno's. He could feel Findekáno's warmth as it seeped through his clothes; he could smell where his new body and Findekáno's scents had already begun to intermingle. Maitimo's belly was full and his hröa content, and though his fëa worried at things it could not control, he continued nuzzling Findekáno until a laugh startled from his beloved friend.

"I believe you have smeared me with blood," Findekáno said, and Maitimo shrank from the words, though they were not angry. "No, no, I have been covered with worse." He laughed and gathered Maitimo closer once more. "The blood of your meal is a far more appealing decoration than the foul blood of orcs."

Findekáno did let him go eventually, to clean the mess in the storeroom, but he gathered Maitimo in his arms once more to climb the stairs, despite the fact that Maitimo was perfectly capable of transporting himself. They encountered Irissë in one of the more well-lit lower rooms, sprawled across the couch. "There, you see?" she said, her voice impatient. "You found your cat after all, and he is not inside to gorge himself on easy food when he should be making use of himself."

"He is new to this house and has not yet become accustomed to it," Findekáno said, his voice as icy as Maitimo had ever heard it. "And he is my cat, besides; you would not wish me to take charge of your horses, so I will thank you to leave Rúnyo alone."

Irissë shook her head. "I realise now why you never had animals, brother," she said. "You coddle them. He is a cat grown, and I see from the blood on your skin and his whiskers that he has made a kill."

Privately, Maitimo agreed with Irissë; he needed no coddling, and he would not have wanted it, besides. The clumsiness that had stricken him could be overcome as his fëa grew accustomed to the hröa it inhabited. He put a paw against Findekáno's cheek and tried to meow this, but he only got fingers stroking soothingly down his side for the trouble.

"Whatever your thoughts, you should have talked to me before you saw fit to carry them out," Findekáno said, and Maitimo could hear the steel of the once High King in his cousin's voice. "You will not carry him out again without first consulting me."

"He knows now where the storeroom is and what treasures lie in wait for him there," Irissë countered. "I will not need to carry him anywhere."

Findekáno's tone immediately melted into something of contrition. "Irissë… I am sorry, it is only that Findaráto and Amarië found him unable to move or hunt in the woods. He ran from them after killing a mouse, and I know not what caused it. I would not have him run from me so soon."

She scowled. "Save your pretty words. You are not truly sorry, and I do not need an apology. Apologize to your cat instead, for underestimating him and leaving him in a land of pretty comforts."

"I will not apologize to Rúnyo, for he could have hunted all he liked no matter where I put him; there is no door barring my rooms, else you would not have gone inside to find him there." Findekáno sighed, and his tone changed. "Do you go riding again?"

"Will you try to stop me?" Irissë challenged.

"I am no Turukáno," Findekáno said, his voice wry. He stood aside, with Maitimo still held firmly in his arms, and Irissë rose from the couch to step past him. She wiggled her fingers briefly in Maitimo's direction as she passed. Once she had left, Findekáno sighed again. "I will apologize to you after all, but it will be for the sake of my sister, who will not apologize herself. She grows lonely, waiting for her son's reembodiment, and it may be a long time before that happens."

Surely it would not be as long as all that, if Carnistir had been reembodied. Maitimo bumped Findekáno's chin gently with his head; Lómion had stayed there as long as any of them, and he had more grief and corrupted loneliness in his soul than true rage as Fëanáro and Ëol had. He would return shortly, for his mother was here, and they would live together for the rest of days.

Findekáno stood there for a long moment, as silent as stone, the only signs of life the rise and fall of his chest and the steady thump of his heart. Finally, he let out a slow breath. "Perhaps I am lonely, too," he said softly, no louder than a breath. "I have grown so attached to you in such a short period of time. How is that? Not a day ago you were simply Findaráto and Amarië's silly lost cat, and now you are as dear to me as my own heart, as much so as any animal can be." An exhale. "Perhaps that is because you have shown me such love in return, love that Findaráto assures me you did not show to them."

Maitimo could have wept. Instead, he pushed his face frantically up against Findekáno's shoulder, letting the purr rumble through him in the hopes it would comfort his beloved cousin as well. Eventually, Findekáno moved them up to his rooms once more.

* * *

Life as Findekáno's cat fell into a comfortable routine. Maitimo had no abilities besides hunting, so he put himself to use climbing down into the storeroom daily to feast upon the bolder mice. If no mice showed their faces, he would return to Findekáno and meow at the empty bowl so that he would be fed in accordance to the needs of his stomach. He was not forced to overhunt or go hungry, and though Findekáno did not always stay, Nolofinwë's servants fed him regularly until Findekáno's return. The longest Findekáno stayed out was one month, or near as Maitimo could tell, but he returned with low-voiced promises that he would take Rúnyo with him if he ventured forth for so long again.

And then, just as Maitimo had begun to relax into this way of living, Lómion returned to life.


	2. Chapter 2

Irissë's travels took her further away from Nolofinwë's house and for longer than Findekáno's. Maitimo recalled that she had always been more well-suited to travel than to confinement. When Lómion came to the door and requested entry in a firm, clear voice, Irissë was not there to greet her son, nor Anairë her grandson.

Nolofinwë himself opened the door as Findekáno sat up; he had been lying on his back with Maitimo on his stomach, and the sudden movement startled a protesting noise from Maitimo's throat.

"You are my grandson," Nolofinwë said, his eyes wide with realization, and he stepped forward to fold Lómion into an embrace. Lómion stood stiff, his eyes wide, though he did not pull away. Maitimo felt kinship with him, as Findekáno had put his arms around Maitimo tightly in response to this. Maitimo stood and hauled himself up onto Findekáno's shoulder so that Findekáno could step forward and join the greeting of his nephew.

The reunion distracted Findekáno, and Maitimo made his escape to the floor moments later. He trotted a safe distance away so that he would not interfere and sat down to gaze upon the proceedings. Nolofinwë's face was wet with tears of joy, and he clasped Lómion's shoulder as soon as Findekáno had let go. "Maeglin, my grandson; I hear many things about you; about your betrayal of Gondolin and your conspiracy with Morgoth, Lord of Evil." Lómion's face tightened, but Nolofinwë continued. "But I also hear from my son that you have fought for us in battles past, and from your mother that you were not raised with the love of a father, as should have been the due of any child."

Maitimo almost wanted to laugh at the look of shock on Lómion's face. He had expected differently; of course. But Maitimo well knew by now that all Nolofinwë's ire he saved for Fëanáro and Morgoth, and even then Nolofinwë might one day long in the future be willing to embrace his half-brother in truth. Nolofinwë's own family he would love and care for like no other, with no reservations, and Maitimo had always known this. He was startled to feel an ache— not for his father, who loved his sons well enough in his own way but had grown away from any gestures of love long before Ambarussa the younger's death— but for his mother, who he had not seen in Ages. She had known how foolish their venture was long before Fëanáro had set the ships ablaze; would she embrace him again, knowing what he had done, or would she reject him as she had rightly rejected their father?

But even had he the ability to speak, he would not have ruined this reunion. He wished only joy for Lómion, knowing how hard the young man had toiled in the Halls of Mandos for his sins.

The initial flurry of explanations began. Nolofinwë explained Irissë's absence, to which Lómion nodded calmly and showed only acceptance. Lómion asked that he not be called by the name Maeglin, for his father had given it, and he had worn it in a period of time he was no longer proud of. When these had passed, Findekáno picked up Maitimo once more. "This is Rúnyo," he explained. "You may see him about this house while you wait for Irissë, or you may find him hunting in the storerooms below. He is a good cat and will not bite, but do take care with him, for I would not see him carelessly treated."

It was the wrong thing to say, and Maitimo batted Findekáno gentle even as Lómion's eyes narrowed. "I would not hurt your precious cat," he snapped, and he withdrew in upon himself.

Maitimo took in the widening of Findekáno's eyes and sighed even as he struggled free to drop to the floor. He padded over to Lómion and deliberately bumped his head up against Lómion's ankle, then looked back at Findekáno.

"Twice scolded," Findekáno murmured. "I did not mean it so, Lómion; only that your mother did not understand at first."

"My mother?" Lómion repeated, and in that moment he sounded not the cruel conspirator but the lost child, wondering at his comparison to the parent he loved without reservation or fear of ill treatment. Maitimo rubbed his cheek against Lómion's leg.

"Your mother my sister," Findekáno confirmed, and the tension between them eased. "We do not always see eye to eye." He crouched down, and the uncertainty in his face made Maitimo trot back towards him to mark Findekáno's knuckles with Maitimo's scent. Findekáno smiled his relief and stroked down Maitimo's spine. "There you are. I feared perhaps my careless remark had turned your affection from me for good."

His tone was light, but Maitimo huffed and sat down next to Findekáno's foot to purr a negation as Findekáno stood.

"Your brother Turgon did not tell me much of her," Lómion said, looking away.

"Turukáno is a—" Findekáno began, but Nolofinwë, looking pained, cut him off.

"Turukáno dwells not here, but far on the outskirts of Tirion. Even reembodied he carries heavy grief."

Lómion folded his arms over his chest and nodded. "I do not ask or expect his forgiveness," he said in a stout tone of voice. "And I will not bother him. It is only that I wish to hear tales of my mother from those who knew her when she was young, before she met Ëol, my father."

Nolofinwë and Findekáno exchanged glances at the sound of that name, and Maitimo wondered what they had heard of him. But Nolofinwë turned back to Lómion with a soft smile, all sharp edges gone from his expression. "If it is stories you seek, you shall have plenty. Come; there are many empty rooms here, and we shall find you one that suits while you await your mother's return. I would like to get to know my grandson, as well, beyond what tale of your deeds would have me believe." He reached out to Lómion and did not flinch away from his skin even when Lómion himself sidled away as though unused to casual touch.

The three of them left, but Maitimo did not follow; he padded back to Findekáno's room, instead, not wishing to intrude any more upon the privacy of their reunion.

He had not yet fallen asleep when Findekáno joined him, looking not happy but desperately sad. He lay down on his bed and stared up as though the ceiling over his head would melt away and reveal all the mysteries of the stars. Maitimo hopped up on the bed to see if he couldn't banish that awful expression from his beloved cousin's face. Findekáno, for once, did not look at him, though he began speaking. "It is fine, Rúnyo," he murmured. "This will pass in time. It is always thus after another of the Noldor returns home." He blinked hard. "It is not that I am unhappy with their coming, it is simply…" His voice trailed off, and he was silent for a time. When he resumed talking, it was in a thin whisper. "It is simply that they are not the one I most want to come home."

He began crying then in earnest. They were not the tears of a child fresh with hurt, but the tears of a soldier long-grieved who must shed some of the weight of mourning inside him before he can then resume his life.

Maitimo felt the painful squeeze of a too-small body on his fëa, more keenly than he had felt since first he had come back into this world. He nuzzled Findekáno's fingers first, but they stayed limp, not even rising to pet him absently the way they usually did; and after a few moments Findekáno pulled them away to drape his forearm over his eyes.

Frantic for something to do to help, anything at all, Maitimo pressed his whole body against Findekáno's neck and began lapping as delicately as he could at the tears. A cat's tongue was rough, he knew, but sure he could do this much; for if he stayed and did nothing, his heart would surely break. He felt his own purr like a frantic call through his body, trying to comfort them both and not succeeding.

Finally, Findekáno's tears quieted, and he turned sideways to curl his body around Maitimo's. "Oh, Rúnyo," he whispered. "I do not know what I would do without you. I lived those first centuries expecting I would not have to wait long for him, for his selfless deeds outshine all else, and I have told all who would listen, but— I fear sometimes that he lived to long at the mercy of the oath he made, and I shall never get him back."

His arms tightened around Maitimo almost to the point of pain, but Maitimo heeded this not. It matched the pain in his fëa; in that way, it was a relief. He ceased licking at Findekáno's skin, as he could feel the heat of abused skin under his tongue, and instead he rubbed his head under Findekáno's chin. There was no doubt of whom Findekáno spoke, though Maitimo did not wish to have that knowledge. Many times throughout all the Ages he had thought to himself that Findekáno should give his love to another, to an Elf who would be present in Valinor. He had thought this after the ships had burned; he had thought this after Nolofinwë's fall; he had thought this in the Halls of Mandos. Findekáno deserved to love an Elf who could hold him when he cried, who could smile at his joy.

_Perhaps the Valar sent me back to kill your love for me, that you might find peace,_ Maitimo said, but he did not try to speak it. _But I find I know not what to do. I only love you the more, now, cousin, and I would not have you pine for love of me. I would have you live and be happy as you once were._

He could not convey this with his small body, he knew, so he moved down to Findekáno's chest and purred loud enough that Findekáno laughed through a few fresh tears. "Perhaps you are a gift from the Valar after all," he said. "All others save my father have long tired of my tears for him. You, at least, are new to this, and you cannot speak to tell me my tears are for one unworthy of them."

They were, and Maitimo would have said so; but Findekáno spoke true, and Maitimo could tell him nothing save what he could convey with the limited sounds of a cat and what his body could convey. _Give up on me,_ he said with a press of his paw pad on Findekáno's cheek. He kept his claws safely retracted and well away from Findekáno's smooth skin. _Find another to love as you once did me. I will bear you no ill will for it, and I will take joy in the thought of your happiness._

"I love him," Findekáno said, instead, the words raw and anguished as though they were a beating heart ripped from his body. "I have always loved him. Even as a child, I wished— but it was not to be, and I—"

Instead of continuing, he pulled Maitimo closer and buried his face in Maitimo's fur. Maitimo closed his eyes, those unfinished sentences ripping into his fëa. He continued to purr as the damp of Findekáno's tears seeped through his fur to tickle uncomfortably at the skin beneath.

* * *

Cat ears were as sensitive as Elven ears, or near enough, so Maitimo knew that the others had not left the house and thus could not be ignorant of Findekáno's grief. The only sign Nolofinwë had heard, however, was that he placed a hand upon Findekáno's shoulder in passing. Perhaps there had been no servants in the house at the time; Maitimo had not paid enough attention to know.

Lómion, however, took to looking at Findekáno sidelong, as though trying to figure him out. Maitimo tried to ignore it, for the most part; there was nothing he could do about it, after all. But he stayed closer to Findekáno in the days following Lómion's arrival, in case Findekáno fell to his grief again; when Lómion finally decided to talk, Maitimo found himself trapped in the same room, curled up on Findekáno's lap as deft hands stroked him.

"Who was it that you loved?" Lómion asked, his words blunt. Maitimo flinched under Findekáno's hands.

Findekáno did not seem bothered by the question; neither his answer nor his hands hesitated. "Maitimo is the one I loved," he said, "though you would know him by a different name. Did Irissë never tell you of this? For she knew, as surely as any of my siblings knew. I would cry his praises to all who would listen, until we departed from Valinor and my words no longer fell upon tolerant ears."

"My mother did not often speak of love," Lómion replied, and Maitimo heard in his voice the tremor of something Ages old, that the Halls should have healed. He closed his eyes and contemplated slipping out of hearing, but Findekáno's hands did not cease their motion. The thought of the storeroom's dim light and the faint smell of old blood did not appeal. Both Lómion and Findekáno were silent, besides, and Maitimo thought the conversation might have ended there until Lómion raised his head again. "Many of the Elves you would have known in Valinor are kin to you."

Findekáno's flinch was so small that only Maitimo could have noticed. "Yes," he said softly. "Though I did not often speak of it, it is no secret. He is my cousin; you would have known him as Maedhros."

Maitimo tensed again under Findekáno's hands, but Lómion did not press for details. Instead, he said quietly and with less bitterness than he might have once: "I loved my cousin, once. She did not return that love."

"Oh," Findekáno said, and he relaxed all at once. After a moment, he laughed. "Well, now I truly feel that you are my nephew. I am sorry that our line is brought to this."

Lómion shook his head. "I thought for a time that it was my father's corruption that moved in me. I have his rage and his greed, and…" He frowned and shook his head. "I have had this long to think on it, and hearing you now— I do not think my love for her was wrong. Not that. I think what was wrong, what Nienna made me see, was what my father's example turned that love to." He swallowed and raised a defiant chin. He looked young, yet in the body of a child as he was. The Halls of Mandos had healed him, had made it possible for him to come back and say this so easily, but they had not aged him. Only his experiences had done that. "If I had stayed away when her heart grew towards another, that love would not have been wrong."

Findekáno had a soft look in his wide eyes. "Yes," he said softly. "That is how I have always thought. It is not who we love but how we love."

Lómion took a deep breath. His voice held a defiant edge as he spoke again. "Though her husband was mortal, she will not love again. She will never love me as I did her." He pressed a hand over his heart. "Nienna has dulled it, so that it does not hurt so badly. I will not allow myself to be driven to anger by it again."

"Sometimes I wish that Nienna would come more readily to the living. But then I wonder if I truly want my grief dulled, if that means I would love him less for it. And I do not pray to her."

"I would rather have it dulled," Lómion said. "I do not think I love her less: I think my love for her was never what it should have been. When I lived— in Gondolin." He stumbled over the words, coming to a halt before starting again. Maitimo watched as a confidence settled about Lómion like a veil for a moment, false and seductive, before he shook his head and banished it. "It felt sometimes as though Ëol's dart struck me indeed, as he had intended, and the poison seeped through all my limbs. As though her loving me back was the only thing that would heal it, and she _wouldn't_. She never will. Before, there was nothing I wouldn't do—" He shook his head again and said in a stilted voice, "I hope your cousin is reembodied soon."

The words were a dismissal of the subject, but as Lómion rose to his feet, Findekáno straightened. "Lómion," he said, his voice deep and strong and sure, as it had been in the days when Findekáno commanded all of Beleriand's Noldor. "Thank you."

Lómion's shoulders, which had stiffened at the sound of his name, relaxed, but he did not respond as he left the room. Findekáno sat back with a sigh, and when Maitimo risked a glance upwards, he could see a smile playing along Findekáno's lips.

After that discussion, Findekáno began to take Lómion outside the city walls for hunts. He had never been as patient as his sister about hunting animals, and, indeed, most of the time they returned to Nolofinwë's home empty-handed. Maitimo took it upon himself to show them up, and he spent those days in the storeroom.

* * *

A few weeks after Lómion's first visit, Findekáno returned home with a frown creasing his forehead. Even stranger, he did not immediately go to Maitimo for comfort; instead, he sat himself on the side of the bed, elbows on his knees, and stared down at Maitimo like he knew not what to do. Maitimo swiveled his ears, but Lómion and Nolofinwë were discussing something in low enough tones that he could not understand the words, and they did not sound worried. This was a problem only of Findekáno's, then. Perhaps he was grieving again, though he did not smell sad.

Maitimo placed his paws on Findekáno's shin, hauling himself up to balance on his hind feet and Findekáno's leg, meowing softly to try to provoke some sort of response. _I would heal your ills if I could,_ he thought, and he patted at Findekáno's knee.

Findekáno stared at him a moment longer, then let out a long breath and leaned back so that Maitimo had the space to jump into his lap. "I worry over nothing, don't I?" he murmured, and then, louder, he said, "Had you more success than we in your hunt? I find for myself that though I love the chase, I love not the kill anymore. I can bring myself only to kill fish, for I enjoy their taste. And Lómion, though skilled in combat and strategy, has inherited none of his mother's affinities otherwise."

_You like him,_ Maitimo thought fondly, and he leaned up again to bump his head under Findekáno's chin. Even this strange mood did not tarnish the brightness that was Findekáno. Even to the private glimpses of a cat, he was back to the laughing, smiling self that Maitimo so adored. It gave him hope that even upon his death, Findekáno might be all right. He would heal, and he would survive, as he had done throughout these Ages, and perhaps even against his will the love he bore Maitimo might one day fade and allow Findekáno to love another more suited. Or perhaps he would at least acquire another cat.

He could not seem to purr after that, but he lay in Findekáno's lap nonetheless and found himself falling asleep. He woke much later to find Findekáno having changed positions without removing Maitimo, reading by the light of a lamp. Maitimo sat up, concerned by the darkness, and Findekáno immediately set down the book to smile at him. "What is it?" he murmured.

Maitimo could not answer, of course, but he reached up to press the pad of his paw to Findekáno's mouth. Findekáno closed his eyes and sighed and kissed Maitimo's paw. Maitimo flinched and immediately drew it back, but Findekáno only smiled the wider as he opened his eyes once more.

"Are you telling me to be quiet, dear one?" Findekáno said. Maitimo huffed, and Findekáno laughed softly. "Are you concerned for my eating habits, then? If I did not know better, I might assume you were a mother cat. All is well, Rúnyo; I ate upon the hunt, and my stomach causes me no distress. I would have you stay with me, though. I fear if you do not, I will turn to melancholy and despair. " Despite his words, his tone was light and teasing, and Maitimo's tail lashed.

The room fell silent, and Maitimo found himself leaning against Findekáno's chest, surrounding himself with Findekáno's scent. It was a dangerous trap he found himself in, that he did not wish to leave and break Findekáno's heart again. Yet he could not talk, could not soothe Findekáno with words or do aught but remain here as a comforting presence. And the trap became stifling, sometimes; Maitimo's entire hröa itched with the sensation of being _too small_ , and all he could do when the pain came was to lie as still as possible and hope that the cat's need for slumber would take him far away from it.

Findekáno touched him gently, as he had the first time they met, as though he were once again afraid that Maitimo would break or bite. "I was very lonely before you came, Rúnyo," he whispered, as though sharing a secret. It was no secret; Maitimo had heard it many times before, said louder, so that the others of the house might easily hear. "I am a selfish man; even surrounded by my father and my siblings and even my other cousins, I cannot always see them."

Maitimo jabbed sympathetically at Findekáno's leg, though he still could not purr.

Findekáno leaned down to kiss the top of Maitimo's head. "Perhaps tomorrow," he said, still in that confiding tone, "we shall travel together. Ambarussa have gone without the well-wishes of their eldest cousin for far too long. Would you come along to see them, Rúnyo? I did promise that I would not travel far without you." He said this with a sly undertone to his voice that Maitimo could not interpret. He put his ears back, and his tail lashed again. "No? Well, think upon it. I will ask you again in the morning, and I will feed you with freshly caught fish if you do me this favor."

Maitimo did not want to see his brothers again like this any more than he had wanted to insert himself into Findekáno's life— which, he admitted to himself, meant that he wanted to see them but should not. Falling asleep that night was difficult as it had not been before for this body, and he contemplated a great many things such as running away again. If it did not mean hurting Findekáno as well, he might have done it. Instead, by the morning, he was resolved: he would go with Findekáno and face his brothers.

* * *

"Hello, Ambarussa!" Findekáno called cheerfully. The twins, it seemed, dwelt outside Tirion still, though not so far away as Formenos had been. Three days of travel had brought them to a sprawling expanse of garden that connected a number of white buildings. This place was no single manor house, nor was it a village in truth. Maitimo's ears flattened as he took in the buildings with his cat's eyes; there was a familiarity about the buildings, as though his mother had a hand in their design.

"Ambarussa the elder, it seems," Findekáno murmured, "was reembodied swiftly, for he had done little enough by comparison to—" He caught himself. "To the others. He stroked Maitimo's fur. "The three of them together built this hall in the beginning of the Third Age, with room enough for Nerdanel and all her sons, when they dwell not with their new parents. I have visited it only twice, for the emptiness of these homes haunts me. But all shall be returned in time."

_Not all,_ Maitimo thought, and his tail lashed.

Still, he would not dishonour himself further by running away. It stung him sometimes that running away seemed the only thing he could do in this small body without words and without even a single hand. He allowed Findekáno to continue stroking him, soothing him, to hold him close as Findekáno dismounted. He was not prepared for Findekáno to withdraw that support and set him down on the ground. "You can explore if you like," Findekáno offered. "They will not mind, and perhaps there are mice here."

There was a slyness to Findekáno's tone that Maitimo mistrusted, but before he could think of some way to try to work Findekáno's plan out of him, a voice Maitimo hadn't heard in Ages spilled out into the air. "Cousin! It has been so long!"

Panic flooded Maitimo, and before he could calm it, his feet were pounding against the ground as he fled. He slowed to a stop only when he could no longer hear his youngest brother's voice, when the flood of ancient memories could no longer haunt him. He found himself in a hall filled with light and intricately carved marble designs. He padded onward, aware that he was lost, but confident in Findekáno's ability to find him. Eventually. So long as he stayed in these buildings, he would not truly be lost.

And if he were, he reminded himself, it would be no great problem, for it would mean that Findekáno did not wish his presence after all, and he had honed his hunting skills well enough that he might survive in the wild better than he could have when he had first set out from Findaráto and Amarië.

He passed a doorway and paused, something beyond his conscious perception tugging on his awareness. He heard the sound of movement within, then footsteps. "Hello?" called a voice, and Maitimo felt as though he'd been doused in ice water.

_Mother._

He couldn't very well freeze to make himself less visible to her eyes, for his tail had begun lashing at the onset of strong emotion and could not be stopped. He stared up at her, and for a moment it was as though he were a small child again, before he had grown taller than her. He had forgotten the strength and confidence she exuded; while not as charismatic and driven as Fëanáro, she was every bit his match in all things.

_If only you had been a match for his grief,_ Maitimo though, and Nerdanel's gaze lighted upon him.

"Ah, a cat?" she murmured. "And what are you doing in here? I thought you were one of my sons come to pester me again." She paused and crouched down. "We have not had a cat in here before; we are too far from Tirion to attract any tame enough. Where do you hail from?"

Maitimo's tail lashed again, and Nerdanel made a soothing sound as she held out her hand. "There, there," she said. "I'm not going to harm you."

Maitimo did not bother to sniff; he instead shifted to press his head desperately against her hand, seeking contact.

"Your fur is so lovely," she said. "An undercoat like dying embers, and the tips as brown as my own. See?" She pulled a lock of her hair forward. Maitimo could not properly see the color as he one might have, and so he looked away. "You have a hidden flame within you. You could inspire any artist." She chucked her fingers under his chin. "You are well fed and well gromed, and you have no shyness of touch. You are then a cat who belongs to someone, though I know not to whom. Someone familiar, perhaps, for you feel very like someone I used to know…"

She trailed off, her eyes going distant, and Maitimo very much did _not_ want her thinking about the possibility that he might be connected to one of her sons. As far as he was aware, the Valar had not reembodied anyone else in the form of an animal; Námo himself had treated it as something rare. She shouldn't be able to guess, but Maitimo did not wish to take chances.

He had no idea how else to distract her, so he simply flopped onto his side before rolling onto his back, baring his stomach to her questing hands. She laughed, the peals ringing out against the walls, and he melted into the sound. He felt healed by her joy in the same way he felt broken by Findekáno's grief. This was something he had never hoped to experience again; he had not even let himself think about it. Perhaps he had done his mother disservice by forgetting, but she had been absent for most of his life, remaining behind in Valinor while he foolishly followed his father on the maddest quest imaginable.

She had not been there for his misdeeds, but she would know of them by now, as Findekáno did. She would have heard the stories of Elves long reembodied who had fallen to Maitimo's sword or suffered for what he had done.

"Still," she said as she scratched his chest with firm, sure fingers. "There is something familiar about you. I cannot but wonder." Maitimo tried to wiggle to distract her, but she pinned him with the hand on his chest and gazed at his face. "I am not so skilled others, for there is no need to do this normally, but…"

‹ _Hello,_ › her voice rang out in his head, like the firm tolling of a bell that cannot be ignored.

And in the midst of his panic, Maitimo found the space for incredulity. _Why would you speak to a cat?_ he wondered, and he realised too late that the widening of his mother's eyes meant she could hear him as clear as though he had spoken. Ósanwe was not something he had even considered, and yet his mother had plucked his secrets from him already, as easily as she always had.

"Maitimo," she breathed aloud, then picked him up and held him against her in a firm but careful embrace. ‹ _Why have you come back in this form, my son? What of Tyelkormo and Atarinkë?_ ›

Maitimo heaved a sigh and breathed in his mother's scent. She smelled also of sweat and the particular ash of the forge. ‹ _I was given no choice, else I would not have returned to give false hope,_ › he said. ‹ _And I would not have you speak of it to others, for I will die in this body as any mortal creature would._ ›

He did not think he imagined the tremble in Nerdanel's hands at that. "No," she said firmly. "There is no love affair with a mortal you have had; I do not believe the Valar would be so cruel."

‹ _I am not the naïve youth who left your side on that day so long ago,_ › Maitimo said. His hearted ached at the grief he heard in his mother's tone, mirrored by his own.

"So too has Carnistir; yet there is space for him within these halls that I have built, when he feels the need to come back from his new family's home." Nerdanel stroked his fur. "No; I will not believe this, for I have done no wrong, and the Valar would not be so cruel as to give my eldest son back in this form only."

Maitimo had no answer for that, so he simply rested against her shoulder as she breathed in shaky gasps.

Much later, Ambarussa and Findekáno found them with Nerdanel sitting cross-legged against the wall, with Maitimo tucked against the underside of her knee. She still had not washed from whatever project she had come in from, for she would not let Maitimo go, and Maitimo did not wish to upset her further by leaving. He stirred, though, at the approach of footsteps, and said, ‹ _Please do not tell them; I would not sadden them further._ ›

‹ _Do you truly believe it would be better to give them false hope that you have merely been delayed in the Halls?_ › Nerdanel asked, and her mind's voice was very sad indeed.

‹ _Please, Mother._ ›

Nerdanel did not answer, though he looked up to see her smiling at Findekáno's approach. "Ah, so it is you who has brought this troublemaker into our house!" she said, and Maitimo hoped that Findekáno could not hear the way her voice shook. "I would rise to greet you, but I fear I would dislodge your cat."

Findekáno laughed softly and said nothing of Nerdanel's unhappiness. "I see he has found you after all. Since he cannot introduce himself, I will tell you: I call him Rúnyo, for the color of his fur."

"Rúnyo," Nerdanel repeated quietly, resting her hand over Maitimo's ribs. "It suits him well. He would match well with this house, for his hair is a match for mine, though less of a flame than Ambarussa's."

Ambarussa the younger laughed as Maitimo tensed. "I fear you would get no work done, if this is how you spend your time with the cat around," he said, his tone so light and carefree that Maitimo could remember that his early death meant he had been free from most of the suffering, had perpetrated none of it save the slaughter of the Teleri.

Findekáno knelt in front of them and embraced Nerdanel as though the rift between their families had never happened. "Hello, aunt," he said. "Rúnyo certainly seems to enjoy your company. I fear he did not find the trip or the arrival pleasant, but I see he is content again in your presence."

"Is that so," Nerdanel said, her voice still soft. "Does he treat you well?"

"Do you ask the cat or myself?" Findekáno laughed. "I will answer, for Rúnyo cannot: he treats me very well indeed. His coming has been a blessing, for I fear I was lonelier than I realised. He has been a fine companion and an excellent hunter of mice." His expression and tone grew more serious. "Yet if he finds it more enjoyable to be here and would not make the journey back with me, I would leave him here to soothe your heart as well, and I would smile to do so."

Nerdanel looked down at Maitimo. Maitimo met her gaze. "I do not know if this Rúnyo staying would be able to ease my heart," she murmured. "I fear he may have already broken it. His presence reminds me of all I have lost and all I have yet to lose."

Maitimo's ears went back. He didn't want to hear this. ‹ _Mother,_ › he said, but in his own grief could not find any other words.

Findekáno stayed very, very quiet for a long moment, and Maitimo could hear the murmurs of Ambarussa talking to each other in their private language, voices hushed. "What mean you by that?" he asked slowly.

‹ _Do not tell him,_ › Maitimo begged again. ‹ _You do not know his grief; I could not bear leaving him alone again if he knew his cat to be me._ ›

‹ _How much crueler for him to never know that you came back for him? Do you not hear in his voice that he already suspects?_ › Nerdanel retorted, and her fingers tightened suddenly against him, such that he almost felt pain, before she took a deep breath. "Ambarussa, come here, both of you. Down on the floor with us; I know you are not suddenly shy of dirt. You wonder why we make this fuss over a mere cat."

Maitimo, desperate, struggled briefly before realizing that such a thing served no purpose except to make him look ridiculous. If they would shortly know him against his will, he would at least attempt to be the older brother they had once looked up to. He went still, and found his gaze caught upon Findekáno's face even as Ambarussa came forward and sat crosslegged on the floor as Nerdanel was.

"What is it, Mother?" the elder asked.

"Your eldest brother is returned to us," she said, her voice carrying, "in a form new to us."

Findekáno's face tightened, but he did not look surprised; he simply licked his lips and watched Maitimo back.

Ambarussa were more dubious. "Russandol?" the elder asked. "Mother, that's a cat. Why would the Valar bring him back in that form?"

Maitimo's heart beat too fast in his chest, his paws tense against his mother's knee, poised for action.

"I do not know," Nerdanel said, "and neither does he."

That drew all their attention from Maitimo to her. "What do you mean?" Findekáno demanded with a peculiar intensity. "He's a cat; how can you understand him?"

Nerdanel stroked a hand down Maitimo's back. He could feel the tremble in her fingers. "I used ósanwe," she said. "Surely you have not forgotten."

Findekáno's eyes widened, and he dropped his chin. His braids spilled over his slumped shoulders. Ambarussa, by contrast, seemed to think this marvelous. The younger clapped his hands together. ‹ _Russandol?_ › he projected. ‹ _It has been some time, brother._ ›

‹ _Ambarussa,_ › Maitimo returned with as much calm as he could gather. ‹ _You are looking well; I am glad._ ›

‹ _Ambarussa tells me you were the only one to object before the ships went alight,_ › Ambarussa continued. He held out a hand, and Maitimo let out a sigh before butting his head against it. ‹ _I must thank you for that._ ›

‹ _It is not a deed worth thanking,_ › Maitimo thought bitterly, ‹ _for I could not stop it. Nor could any others._ ›

‹ _But I am grateful, and I am back here in Valinor with my mother and my twice-brother, once older, now younger,_ › Ambarussa said. Then, aloud, he added, "Fidnekáno, you grow quiet. Speak you also to my brother?"

Findekáno shook his head. "No," he said. "I do not. My father and mother relied on words rather than ósanwe, and none of us were truly taught in these ways." He looked terrible, stricken, as though he were mortal himself and had aged in body as well as spirit. A day ago, Maitimo would have crawled forward to comfort him with touch. Now, with his secret exposed, Maitimo could only stay frozen where he was and cling to the touch of his youngest brother's mind.

"Well, that is unfortunate," Nerdanel said. "We shall have to teach you."

* * *

Maitimo found himself passed into care of the twins as Nerdanel took Findekáno by the hand and pulled him out of the hallway. Every instinct in Maitimo's fëa urged him to go after them, but his hröa stayed maddeningly put, crouched low to the ground as though it might help him avoid danger. Ambarussa the elder sighed. "How are we to do this?" he asked. "Ósanwe does not work three ways no matter how close the brothers."

"It does," the younger corrected, "but only for one very strong. I shall talk and convey the shape of his words to you; for his part, I believe he can understand us even when we do not speak into his mind. Is this correct?"

‹ _Yes; you know it to be so,_ › Maitimo thought. ‹ _Give him my greetings._ ›

Ambarussa the younger passed this along with a side hug for his brother, as though he thought Maitimo incapable of physical displays of attention. Maitimo corrected him by pushing up from his low crouch on the floor and going over to rest his head briefly against Ambarussa the elder's knee.

‹ _Why are you a cat, then?_ › Ambarussa the younger asked, in his mind and also aloud.

Maitimo's tail lashed. ‹ _It is a punishment,_ › he said. ‹ _I was not innocent after your brother died, and Makalaurë well knows it._ ›

"Makalaurë speaks to none of us about you on his rare visits here," Ambarussa the elder murmured when this was relayed to him. "He travels Valinor, instead, or stays with his new family."

‹ _And he will definitely not return should he know me to be here,_ › Maitimo added bleakly. The twins looked at each other with solemn expressions, but they did not press further.

"Carnistir will come, at least," Ambarussa the elder said. "He feels guilt for his own part. He says you were not willing at first to take up the Oath."

‹ _My actions were my own doing. Or did you think this form simply spite on the part of the Valar? You were never one who believed that._ ›

The younger reached out to pet Maitimo's head. ‹ _I am glad to see you again, brother,_ › he said, and Maitimo could think of no response through the immediate awareness that this could not be joy in truth, for he knew it to be impermanent and that sadness weighted everything he heard.

* * *

Findekáno and Nerdanel returned for a supper cooked by Ambarussa the younger, to Maitimo's surprise. "Do not look so shocked," he said to Maitimo and Findekáno with a wry smile. "There is little else to do in Valinor without my brothers, and without Ambarussa I had not the heart to pursue less transient craft for many centuries. My second parents thought me damaged once I grew old enough to remember, and they encouraged me to learn cooking."

Maitimo nibbled delicately at his fish and thought carefully of nothing at all in particular. Findekáno had not tried to converse with him yet, which he took either to mean that Findekáno had not mastered the fine art or else was waiting until they had more space and privacy.

Nerdanel reached down to the chair she had set Maitimo's dish upon to stroke his back every so often. Not even Findekáno had petted him as he ate; it felt strange, but also soothing. She was his mother, and even in a desperately melancholy situation such as this, her presence had the power to drain some of that away.

Nobody talked about or to Maitimo. Instead, Ambarussa bombarded Findekáno with questions about archery, and afterwards invited him out for a competition shooting at a series of moving targets the elder had invented. Maitimo found himself again left alone with his mother, feeling oddly unbalanced by the abandonment.

‹ _I have spoken with Findekáno,_ › Nerdanel said, which she didn't have to; of course she had. ‹ _He will bring you back to us again once we have collected the rest of your brothers. It will be good for you to speak to all of them._ ›

‹ _I fear it may not be so good for them,_ › Maitimo warned.

Nerdanel simply smiled, a gentle thing, and stroked his back again. ‹ _What would cause you less pain to discuss?_ › she asked. ‹ _You must have something you wish to talk about, if not your brothers._ ›

Maitimo contemplated this, but in the end, he found his answer to be that no, he did not. He had accepted his lack of speech early on, and the only things he wished he could say were half-formed reassurances and explanations that were for Findekáno's ears alone. Instead, he chose to end his day listening to his mother talk about the structure of the house and her latest projects.

* * *

He slept for a long time, tucked away in the bedroom that Nerdanel had insisted he use. He dreamed, or perhaps he simply heard the passing whispers of his family; and in the morning, he emerged to find Findekáno on his horse, preparing to leave. Maitimo yowled his displeasure at this uncharacteristic cowardice and dashed as fast as he could to the horse's legs, heedless of the danger. He sat himself down far enough that he could not easily get stepped upon, but neither could Findekáno progress forward, and stared upwards.

Findekáno gazed down at him, expression bleak, and then laughed softly. "Well," he murmured, "there's a first time for everything." And without explaining himself, he dismounted to help Maitimo up onto the saddle.


	3. Chapter 3

The light of the sun had just dipped below the horizon, the crimson and orange bleeding from the sky as Tilion took his march of the skies, when Findekáno dismounted. "Rúnyo," he said, then sighed. ‹ _Maitimo._ › His ósanwe reached, more tentative than Nerdanel's.

Maitimo closed his eyes and hoped that his response would strengthen it. ‹ _Findekáno,_ › he replied, then waited for the yelling, the distrust.

None came: this was Findekáno, after all. He instead sighed and reached out to scoop Maitimo up, cradling him just as he had so many times before. ‹ _I wish I had thought of this before,_ › he said, rueful. He rested his face against Maitimo's shoulder, and his breath gusted out, hot and tickly as it displaced Maitimo's fur. ‹ _I missed talking to you, Maitimo._ ›

Maitimo rested there, frozen for a few beats of Findekáno's heart before pressing his own nose to the bare skin of Findekáno's neck. He listened to Findekáno's shaky inhale in response. ‹ _I know not what you wish me to say,_ › he admitted. ‹ _I feared you were angry at me, back in the house of my mother and brothers._ ›

‹ _Angry? I could never long hold any true anger for you._ › Findekáno laughed, low and a bit self-mocking, but his hands stayed gentle where they cupped Maitimo's tiny body. ‹ _I did not want to lure you from your family, Maitimo. It has been Ages since you saw them._ ›

‹ _It has been Ages since I saw you,_ › Maitimo replied. He pressed his paw to the pulse at Findekáno's neck. ‹ _Did you think I would so easily leave your side again? I can do little enough in this form; if you would permit it, I would stay with you until you tire of me._ ›

Findekáno's breath went shaky for a moment. ‹ _I will not tire of you,_ › he said. ‹ _I would be glad for your company. Though I will bring you back to see your brothers, as your mother has requested. Perhaps Tyelkormo and Curufinwë will be reembodied and remember in time to see you again._ ›

It was possible, of course, though very unlikely. The possibility left Maitimo feeling too-hot and shaky, that the brothers who had pushed hardest for Maitimo's downfall would be reembodied while Maitimo would be torn forever from the sides of those he loved. But the thought that he would likely never see them again hurt just as badly. He pressed his face against Findekáno's shirt in an attempt to calm himself. ‹ _I am sorry that I can offer little comfort in this body,_ › he said, though Findekáno had recovered already. ‹ _I would ease your hurts better if I could, cousin._ ›

Findekáno shook his head. ‹ _You need not apologize to me. You are here, and I would ask little more of you._ › Then he laughed, though the sound was as quiet as before and lasted only a few seconds longer. ‹ _Rather, there is much more I would ask of the Valar: I would ask them to give you to me in a form which could return my embrace, one where I would not every second be conscious that my strength could break you._ ›

‹ _This body is not_ that _easily broken,_ › Maitimo grumbled, though he knew Findekáno's words to be truth. He let out a sigh of his own, and for a few moments, the ósanwe connection lay between them as mere potentiality. Neither spoke into it.

"I—" Findekáno said finally, aloud, the words scattered and broken. "You should know— before we get back—" He cut himself off, and his fingers flexed.

Maitimo put a paw to Findekáno's mouth. ‹ _You need not say anything now,_ › he said. ‹ _It is the nature of ósanwe that no others will hear our conversation. I would not have you speak in haste._ ›

‹ _It may be in haste anyway._ › Findekáno grimaced, but he settled down to let Maitimo settle in the comfort of his lap, just as they had when Maitimo had been nothing more than a cat there to lift some of Findekáno's loneliness from his shoulders. ‹ _I would not have this go unsaid, now that I know how to speak to you._ ›

‹ _You have always spoken to me,_ › Maitimo said, and he put out his tongue to lick at Findekáno's skin before he remembered that he should not let this body run wild. He pulled his tongue back into his mouth. The instincts of a cat would lead only to embarrassment. He went to sleep, then, and if he dreamed, his dreams were pleasant.

* * *

Tirion sprawled ahead of them, no less magnificent to a cat's eyes. Irissë met them outside the city, her horse shaking its head impatiently. "Hello!" she called, her smile fierce and wide and her white riding clothes gleaming bright and clean in the sun.

Findekáno nodded in greeting and pulled up alongside her. "Hello, sister," he said, his tone that of affected nonchalance. "Have you been home long?"

"No," Irissë said scornfully. "I would not have waited for you if I had not seen you in the distance before I made my entrance."

"Then I am glad to ride together with you," Findekáno said with glee. "Let us get the horses settled together."

Irissë frowned, her eyes darting over his face. "Very well," she said, a challenge in her tone, but she did not ask. Maitimo found himself set down upon the ground as Irissë and Findekáno brushed the horses down and saw to their food and drink. He might have wandered away to hunt mice at this time, to give them their privacy, except that he found himself caught in a storm of his own thoughts. Findekáno had been told the truth, and this put a new urgency on Maitimo's awareness of his own new mortality. How little time did he have left? He knew not how long cats lived, except that it must be less than fifty years. It was so little time, after how long they had been apart; the thought was a difficult one.

Findekáno picked Maitimo up when the horses were cared for. Rather than be cradled like some helpless animal, Maitimo scrambled up to Findekáno's shoulders. Balancing there was more difficult, but he disliked feeling helpless after the dark turn his thoughts had taken.

All together, they made their way back into Nolofinwë's home, which seemed now small and simple in comparison to Nerdanel's sprawling design built to accommodate so many different sons. Nolofinwë lived in a house no less simple for the servants he employed, though still beautiful in a quiet way. Maitimo had not paid attention to the detail of the building before, but now he looked around to take it all in.

To Maitimo's delight, Lómion had visited that day; he was at a table with Nolofinwë, listening solemnly to stories. Nolofinwë's voice stopped as they came in, before Maitimo could hear any of the words. He rose to greet his children, but Maitimo's eyes stayed fixed on Lómion and the way his eyes widened as he saw his first mother.

"Lómion?" Irissë breathed, and then she flew to him, catching him in her arms. Lómion relaxed instantly into her embrace, pressing his face to her shoulder and looking every bit the child he was. "You have found your way back all on your own."

"Of course," Lómion muttered. "I would not leave you alone."

A heavy silence fell; or perhaps it was only heavy because Maitimo was not Irissë or Lómion nor privy to their thoughts. They stayed as they were, with Irissë stroking her hands through her son's thick hair. Lómion submitted to her affection with a curious lack of the embarrassment Maitimo had observed in him with Nolofinwë. The silence was broken not by the two of them, but by Findekáno. He headed to the harp displayed on the other side of the room. He began to pick out a quiet melody, a happy one that Maitimo recognized after a moment as being a song of homecoming and reunion.

Irissë and Lómion startled at the intrusion and broke apart after the first few notes. Irissë glanced over sharply before her expression softened. "You knew he was here," she realised, and she came over to cuff Findekáno lightly around the ears. He grinned up at her. "I should steal your cat for this, you know."

Findekáno's whole face darkened, but it was Lómion who shook his head. "Mother, it is fine," he said, and from the way those words sounded, Maitimo could guess he had not often had occasion to say them. "He would not have known I was here _now_. We had been spending time together, but he had gone to visit his cousins." After he got through that, Lómion made a face that Maitimo could not decipher.

Irissë looked long and hard at Findekáno before she sighed and turned back to Lómion. "Come," she said. "As you have already given your greetings to your grandfather and uncle, we shall retire away from prying ears. Perhaps you would walk with me a bit beyond the city, for I do not find myself tired, now that I look upon your face again."

Lómion's face lit up, and he followed eagerly while Nolofinwë watched them both with a fond, indulgent smile on his face.

"It is a shame," Nolofinwë murmured, "that Itarillë and Lómion will likely never come to visit me at once. They are both my grandchildren; I am so fond of them." He turned to Findekáno and raised his eyebrows. "Especially since you will never have children to add to their number."

Findekáno laughed and raised a hand to stroke Maitimo awkwardly. "I am sorry, Father," he said. "I would not change the way things are, though, and if I have not fallen in love with another in this long, it is doubtful such a change will ever occur."

"I do know that," Nolofinwë said. "I simply wish things had turned out happier for you."

"Grandchildren are not the only sign of happiness," Findekáno said with a shake of his head, and Nolofinwë's expression darkened.

"No," he agreed. "But Irissë has been reunited with someone she loves, and Turukáno's new family has taken in Itarillë. You have only myself; of all my children, you have not kept ties with your new family, and your mother will not spend much time at home until she is finished overseeing her new city."

‹ _Shall I tell him?_ › Findekáno asked, the voice in Maitimo's mind rich with amusement.

‹ _I do not see why not,_ › Maitimo said; though in truth he worried about the reaction Nolofinwë might have to him. He had always like Nolofinwë; they had worked well together, and Nolofinwë had been much calmer in tense situations than impulsive, charismatic Fëanáro. Still, Maitimo would rather him know than not, that Maitimo would not be asking others to lie for him. ‹ _You may tell him if you wish._ ›

In response, Findekáno plucked Maitimo from his shoulders and set him on the table in front of Nolofinwë. "Father," he said, his voice turning to a more formal tone, "I would like you to meet Rúnyo, my cat, who I share companionship with these days. Often in the past I have called him by another name, which I share with you now: Maitimo, son of Nerdanel and your brother, my most beloved cousin."

Nolofinwë's eyes widened, then narrowed. "Do you speak truth?" he demanded. "Your cousin is a cat?"

Findekáno's sly smile slid away. "The ways of the Valar are not always clear to us," he said, "but Nerdanel has reminded me of ósanwe and taught me the basics, that I may speak with him myself. I have since done so: this is Maitimo." His hands rested lightly on Maitimo's side, as though he were ready at a moments notice to pick Maitimo back up. As though Nolofinwë might present a danger to him. Maitimo did not think that the case; he might think so for Arafinwë, but Nolofinwë had been his friend. Were he to attack Maitimo, he would do so with words, or else he would give warning.

Or perhaps, Maitimo realised, Findekáno needed the reassurance. He would have asked Findekáno, but the connection between them had broken. The voice in his head was no longer Findekáno's, but a tinny, distant sound. He was not as close to Nolofinwë as he was to his immediate family and Findekáno; the words were harder to understand. ‹ _Does my son speak truth? Are you Maitimo, once Maedhros?_ ›

Maitimo raised up his head to look into Nolofinwë's eyes. ‹ _I am,_ › he said, as clearly as he could, but Nolofinwë's voice in his head was already gone. He only knew Nolofinwë had heard his words by the breath Nolofinwë let out as he gazed down upon them.

"I had thought the days of excitement long beyond me," he admitted, "yet in such a short time I get to meet my grandson, who was born far after my death, and I discover that the cat you have been keeping is in fact your cousin. And," he added, in a more wry tone of voice, "he is as great a hunter in this form as the last."

Maitimo felt his tail twitch in response to that, and Findekáno laughed. "He is. Very well, Maitimo, which shall it be tonight? Mouse or fish?"

Maitimo lashed his tail again and hopped off the table. He headed down to the storeroom without glancing back, that he might leave the two of them alone to discuss what they would in private.

* * *

Findekáno and Maitimo would have had plenty of time alone in Nolofinwë's house, but Maitimo kept to the daily routine that had been established. He felt hunting in the storeroom to be more of a duty now, as the family now knew all he had to make amends for. Findekáno did not protest, for he had his own projects to attend, but he became more attentive of the time. He came back at night, now, to stroke Maitimo to sleep even if they spoke not.

Despite Findekáno's acquiscence, Maitimo assumed that something had changed when someone entered the storeroom unexpectedly. He stood from his crouch to greet his visitor, only to find that it was Lómion, with a sour look upon his face and smelling of the kind of anxiety that Maitimo was learning to pick out by scent even when suppressing the cat's instincts. He knew not why Lómion _was_ nervous, only that the straightened shoulders and the forward-facing head were proven a lie by the way his hands clenched into fists at his sides and his jaw clenched just a bit too hard.

Maitimo could not initiate the ósanwe, but he sat down in front of Lómion and waited.

After a long moment of staring at him, Lómion sighed and crouched down. "I remember you from the Halls of Mandos," he said. "You often followed me as a pure fëa. I did not ask you why, then."

Maitimo stared at him, his tail flicking in mild irritation, and attempted to convey through stillness the fact that he could not answer save in ósanwe. When Lómion simply stared back at him, Maitimo stood and approached to put his paws on Lómion's leg. Lómion flinched back but did not unbalance.

‹ _Do you wait for this?_ › Lómion's voice asked. The words were stronger than Nolofinwë's, to Maitimo's surprise, and he could feel the reluctance with which Lómion used it.

‹ _You are Irissë's son and Findekáno's nephew,_ › Maitimo explained, choosing to ignore the second question. ‹ _The company of my brothers was not easy, once most of them had left; those who lingered held to their anger and to our father when I could no longer bear it._ ›

Lómion looked to the side. ‹ _I needed no watching over,_ › he said, but Maitimo could feel the uncertainty in the words. Ósanwe was a language for truth, or truth as the speaker believed it; it did not fit so easily around lies as words of the mouth were. ‹ _The Halls of Mandos are not dangerous._ ›

‹ _I did not believe you to be in danger,_ › he said. ‹ _I believe it was not for your sake that I sought you out; rather, it was my own, for I do not like to sit idle._ ›

‹ _You are not sitting idle in the Halls now,_ › Lómion replied. ‹ _Is this better?_ › He moved to seat himself cross-legged with a huff of breath.

Maitimo considered this, even though the sharp dissonance of Lómion's words indicated that he had simply picked up Maitimo's words and thrown them back: a game of sorts rather than a true conversation. ‹ _It is better in some ways,_ › he admitted, ‹ _but it is not what I would have wished for myself if I had been given a choice. It is no matter; I gave up the right to choose my own fate long ago, by refusing to fight against what was chosen earlier._ ›

Lómion snorted, but he did not say anything to that. Instead, he rested his elbows on his knees. ‹ _Mother believes I should thank you for it._ ›

Maitimo blinked to readjust to the shift in topics. ‹ _Truly? I might have guessed that she would tell me to keep my fëa to myself._ ›

‹ _My father is still in the Halls,_ › Lómion explained, then corrected himself. ‹ _My first father. She believes your presence kept him away when she could not._ ›

‹ _I do not think so, else he would have come to you earlier. It is more likely that the Valar kept him away, for Námo sees all._ ›

Lómion nodded, and some of the tension in his body dissipated. ‹ _That is my belief. They have been kind to me, and I would not like to think that they would so easily let us close to those who might harm us again._ › The last few words rang oddly, and Maitimo realised from Lómion's grimace that he had tried to stop himself from saying them.

Maitimo thought of all the people he was saying goodbye to, by being here, and his tail lashed. He didn't say anything; he could not have put into words what he felt at that moment. Lómion finally sighed and continued to speak. ‹ _I didn't know you were in love with your cousin, too,_ › he said, ‹ _else I might not have avoided you so thoroughly. I spoke of it only to Nienna, in the Halls._ ›

Maitimo put his paw on Lómion's leg again.

‹ _I do not think I will ever truly fall in love,_ › Lómion said, as though the ósanwe had ripped it from him, ‹ _for I do not think I know how. I watch my new parents and learn romantic love from afar, but I do not think I know how to love without desperation._ ›

‹ _Do you tell me this because I am mortal?_ › Maitimo asked. ‹ _Those in this house love you. Have you met Anairë yet?_ ›

Lómion rested his chin on the palm of his hand and slowly shook his head. ‹ _I am told she builds a city together with her close friend Eärwen and does not often return,_ › he said.

Maitimo sighed and pressed the top of his head against Lómion's knee. Lómion did not move away, but neither did he speak further. ‹ _I must catch mice for my supper,_ › Maitimo said finally. ‹ _But I will speak to you again when you are not scaring the rodents away._ ›

Lómion nodded and stood, shedding Maitimo like a skin. He walked out without another word. Maitimo let himself exhale in a huff and went back to hunting, though his mind stayed elsewhere. Lómion might never love another as a wife, but he loved his mother, and Maitimo thought perhaps he loved his new family just as well. And for himself, who was Maitimo to speak of romance, when he and Findekáno had never married? In the beginning, they had believed they had all the time in the world to change their fathers' minds and win approval, and after that the vastness of Beleriand had separated them for all but a few stolen moments.

* * *

Maitimo did catch a mouse, despite his distraction, and he ate it with rather more gusto than he might have on any other day before making his way back to Findekáno's room for the completion of his normal routine. Findekáno was not there, so Maitimo groomed himself all over to rid himself of blood and dirt before leaping up on the bed and curling into a circle to doze.

When he next woke, it was still light, and he experienced a moment's disorientation before he realised that it must instead be light _again_ for him to feel as refreshed as he did. He blinked and lifted his head to see Findekáno sitting beside him on the bed, looking down at him with a solemn tilt to his lips. ‹ _Hello, Maitimo. You sleep so deeply like this._ ›

‹ _This body is mortal and requires rest,_ › Maitimo reminded him. He stretched and stood, moving closer to Findekáno so that he might be petted. ‹ _Did your conversation go well?_ ›

‹ _I cannot say that it went poorly,_ › Findekáno replied with a small smile curling the corners of his mouth. ‹ _I see by your lack of hunger that the hunt went well._ ›

‹ _I have little else to offer,_ › Maitimo began, but Findekáno shook his head fiercely at that, sending his braids flying in the air.

‹ _Is that why you do this?_ › he demanded. ‹ _Do you believe that you must prove your worth or we shall not keep you? Maitimo, how can you think that?_ ›

Maitimo blinked at him. ‹ _I think you have been kind when you do not need to be,_ › he said. ‹ _I do not believe you would ask me to do this; I would do so nonetheless, for I care for you and would do what little I can._ ›

Findekáno took a deep breath. ‹ _Your presence here is enough._ › He gathered Maitimo to him, ignoring Maitimo's grunt at the unexpected motion. Finekáno nuzzled his face against Maitimo's fur and laughed softly as his face brushed against Maitimo's whiskers. ‹ _I would rather have you in your own body, but I will take you in whatever form you are given to me. You could appear as an orc, and I would embrace you._ ›

Maitimo squinted his eyes distastefully at the thought. ‹ _None of the Valar yet living free would do such a thing,_ › he said. ‹ _Do not even think of it._ ›

Findekáno laid a smacking kiss on the top of Maitimo's head. ‹ _I shall do as you ask, beloved cousin mine._ › He began to hum, instead, then sing an old familiar lullaby that Maitimo could feel vibrating in Findekáno's chest like a cat's purr. Maitimo waited quietly until it was done, joining in with a purr of his own, then let Findekáno flop the two of them back so that Maitimo sat upon his chest. ‹ _I am so glad to see you again,_ › he said.

Maitimo's ribcage ached. ‹ _I am glad to have you happy again,_ › he said, ‹ _and I wish I had left you happier before._ ›

‹ _You were not happy at my leaving, either, as I understand it._ ›

‹ _It was not your choice to die on that field,_ › Maitimo said, and he could say it without tears, in this body that could not cry.  ‹ _The plan was mine, and my brothers and I fled when I should have fought my way to your side. I should at least have died beside you, on that field of my own failures._ ›

‹ _Do not say that,_ › Findekáno said sharply, and he hugged Maitimo to him. ‹ _I only wish…_ ›

He trailed off, and Maitimo pressed his nose to Findekáno's shirt. ‹ _It would have been better if I had not kept living. I grew desperate and weary without you, and I slew many innocents who would not otherwise be dead._ ›

‹ _Do you think I do not know that? I have been reembodied for far longer than you, and the slaughtered innocents do not tarry long in the Halls of Mandos._ › Findekáno's voice was fierce. ‹ _I care not. I love you still._ ›

‹ _You do care,_ › Maitimo corrected gently. ‹ _If you did not, you would no longer be the cousin I fell in love with many centuries ago in Valinor._ ›

Findekáno grinned, but it was only a shadow of his usual humor. ‹ _I cannot lie like this,_ › he said. ‹ _Does that mean you no longer love me._ ›

Maitimo sighed and listened to the steady beat of Findekáno's heart. ‹ _I believe I have even more to atone for than I could have imagined,_ › he replied, and Findekáno made no answer. He simply gathered Maitimo closer, and the ósanwe connection ended there.

* * *

Lómion and Irissë returned some time later, after having paid a visit to Lómion's new family. Irissë looked more settled and content than Maitimo had seen her. Perhaps it was the consequence of her long trip; more likely, it had something to do with the presence of her reembodied son. She did not leave his side, and he did not leave hers, even when they addressed others. For Lómion's part, though Maitimo had less to judge on, he looked happier as well, and more comfortable in his own skin. Nolofinwë looked on both of them a fond, indulgent smile and clasped them both to his chest.

"I am well pleased to see my daughter and grandson together at last," he said. "I would give a feast, save that neither of you are the type to enjoy such gatherings. Instead, I have asked for the finest food to be prepared, that we may celebrate alone."

Lómion flushed and ducked his head, and Maitimo sniffed the air. He could smell many things: vegetables and fruits and jams bursting with flavor and spices, all of which would have once set his tongue afire with longing but now left him cold. He could also smell fish aplenty, cooked in a variety of ways, and that made his belly anticipate the meal, though he knew not if he would be invited. He patted at Findekáno's ankle to ask for ósanwe, but Findekáno merely smiled down at him and initiated nothing.

"What have you prepared for my cat?" Findekáno asked, his tone amused. Maitimo batted him more soundly; he had not asked that question.

Nolofinwë raised his eyebrows. "For him, and for us, there shall be fish. I would ask that he does not dine while standing upon the table, for fur would ruin the meal for the rest of us."

Irissë sighed. "And what is so special about your cat that it merits a place at our table?" she asked, her voice weary. Maitimo startled, for Lómion had known the truth of his identity; he had taken that to mean that Irissë knew as well. Perhaps, he thought, she did know and simply snubbed him. He did not think he had done anything to earn her ire in particular, but he had done a great many things, and rarely had he been there to witness the results.

Or perhaps she simply wished that he were Tyelkormo, instead. She had never made a secret of her favorite cousins, and neither had been reembodied.

But Findekáno was blinking at Lómion, whose eyes widened with realization, and Nolofinwë had his eyebrows still raised. "Forgive me, sister, I did not realise— I believed you knew from Lómion." Findekáno licked nervously at his lips and crouched down to put a hand on Maitimo's shoulder. "This is our cousin Maitimo."

Irissë's eyes narrowed, not in anger, but in the manner of one waiting for a joke to be revealed. She looked down at Maitimo for a long moment before finally sighing. "This does explain why I keep finding him in your bed, brother," she said, her words sharp but fond. Findekáno laughed, and even Lómion smiled.

"I have never been the most subtle of Elves," Findekáno said mournfully. "See how they tease me, Rúnyo!" Maitimo batted at his ankle again, surprised to hear the name, and Findekáno beamed down at him. "Very well. Maitimo it is."

Irissë watched this exchange and shook her head. "It is a wonder I did not see it before. It is no wonder you believed that I knew," she added, "though I would ask you why you did not tell me this when you panicked so upon finding him gone, if it is no secret."

"I did not know then," Findekáno admitted. "It was not until we met with his mother that I knew for certain, though I had suspected since Lómion's return." At Lómion's curious glance, Findekáno smiled. "You told me of how he looked for you in the Halls, and my cat greeted you as he has greeted none but myself. I thought it a foolish fancy, but it has turned out to be not so foolish after all."

Maitimo's tail skated restlessly across the floor, back and forth. He could feel the usual twisting in his gut, as happened when he thought upon his own new mortality, and he pressed his head against Findekáno's ankle to calm himself.

Irissë, for her part, crouched down facing Findekáno and looked more closely at Maitimo. He looked back at her; any fear he might have felt upon her realization had been banished by her easy acceptance, along with the other three in the room. And as he had expected, she only sighed after a moment and then stood again. "This is more disturbing than Tyelkormo's attachment to Huan," she informed Findekáno, "for at least Huan was only a dog."

Findekáno's smile slipped. "Right now, Maitimo is only a cat, for all that he once was more," he said. "Though I am thankful that we can now speak to each other when before we could not."

Nolofinwë watched them all for a moment. "Has the matter been settled, Irissë?" he asked. "Will you permit Maitimo at your feast?"

Irissë tilted her head to the side and sighed, then smiled broadly. "I will not object, if only to see my cousin make a fool of himself by eating fish from a cat-sized bowl, face-first." The words were gleeful but without malice, and Maitimo indeed did not mind satisfying her in this regard. It was not humiliation any more than was walking through the halls without clothes or grooming himself with his own tongue; it was the natural way of this body, and Maitimo could find no embarrassment in it.

The feast, quiet and small though it was, with not even a harp playing— Maitimo had determined that Nolofinwë did have servants who cooked and cleaned for him, but they dwelt elsewhere, unlike what Maitimo was accustomed to; Nolofinwë paid them in some other way. After some time, Findekáno himself took up the harp and played songs with a cheerful abandon, hunting songs and songs of Valinor, never touching upon that time in Beleriand that had ended so disastrously for all of them.

The meal was good and the company welcome; Maitimo found himself dozing on his chair until Findekáno startled him awake, long after the eating and the songs had ceased. He found himself carried back to Findekáno's room, the familiar smell of it pulling him into slumber once more.

* * *

When Maitimo awoke, Findekáno had gone. Patrolling the corridors told him only that no Elves remained in the building. He did not worry, save for the thought that Findekáno might have told him where they were all going; the disappearance of four at once said that there was a reason Maitimo should not fear. If they wanted to abandon him, they would have done so by placing him outside, in Tirion or further, not by letting him chase them out with his presence. So he went to the storeroom even though his belly had not yet begun to demand a meal. There was little else to be done.

The others had not returned by the time he moved back into the living quarthers, and Maitimo curled up in the center of Findekáno's bed to surround himself with the lingering scent of his cousin.

They did not return the next day, and Maitimo lost track of time after that. His world narrowed to that of a cat's: sleeping and hunting. He slept as often as he could in Findekáno's bed, though the scent faded, but he also slept in the storeroom on occasion. Thus it was that he missed their arrival until he heard Findekáno's frantic call in his mind. ‹ _Maitimo!_ ›

Maitimo opened an eye and found the dim lighting of the storeroom. ‹ _Findekáno? What is wrong?_ ›

‹ _Nothing at all, save that you are not here! Where are you?_ ›

‹ _I might have asked that myself, if you had spoken to me sooner,_ › Maitimo pointed out calmly. ‹ _But for my part, I am in the storeroom. Have you returned, then?_ ›

Findekáno was silent, for a time, and his words held a lingering sense of embarrassment when he spoke once more. ‹ _I thought you awake,_ › he said. ‹ _I did not use ósanwe, but I did tell you we were leaving— I did not realise you had not heard._ ›

‹ _I am not angry or hurt,_ › Maitimo assured him. He lurched to his feet and stretched to regain his balance before heading towards the main house once more. ‹ _It would serve no purpose if I were; for whatever slights I imagine against myself here would be nothing against the countless sins I have committed towards others._ ›

‹ _Maitimo, please, don't talk that way._ Findekáno met him at the doorway, his eyes tired but his smile genuine, and he bend down to scoop Maitimo into a hug and a carry. ‹ _Irissë wanted to go on a short hunt and meet Lómion's new family; it did not turn out to be so short a trip to one living a cat's life, I am afraid._ ›

‹ _Even a cat would be well suited to looking after itself in your absence,_ › Maitimo pointed out. ‹ _There is plenty of fresh water that I can reach, and I am able to provide food for myself._ ›

He had gone hungry a few days, when the mice proved elusive, but he had swiftly discovered that he would not perish so easily when not well-fed, despite his initial fears about the limitations of a mortal body. Aside from the short lifespan, this body was hearty and had very good instincts.

‹ _Still, I promised to take you with me on longer trips, and I have failed this time._ › Findekáno sighed into Maitimo's fur. ‹ _We will work something out. This is not fair to you._ ›

Maitimo didn't point out that fair as a concept no longer applied to him, for Findekáno would not listen. But he did rub his face against Findekáno's neck until his beloved cousin laughed at the tickle and carried him back up to the room.


	4. Chapter 4

Maitimo had given up on keeping track of the days by the time Findekáno took him once more to Nerdanel's house. The ride was quiet, broken occasionally by brief conversations in ósanwe, and Maitimo found himself lulled easily to sleep by the motion of the horse and the warmth of Findekáno's thigh. Nerdanel met them outside this time, her smile warm and her hands gentle as she plucked Maitimo from his haven.

‹ _Welcome home, my son,_ › she said, and Maitimo blinked at her, then at the assembly behind her. Ambarussa were both there, of course, but joining them were Carnistir and Makalaurë, Carnistir's face as dour as Maitimo had ever seen it, and Makalaurë's too-young and unreadable.

‹ _Hello, mother,_ › Maitimo managed, because he could think of nothing else to say, and Nerdanel's smile grew.

‹ _Have you no words to say to your brothers? I will relay them, when we are all together like this._ ›

Maitimo looked at Makalaurë again, and his tail lashed in apprehension despite himself. ‹ _I would greet them, were I able,_ › he said awkwardly, and Nerdanel passed along his words. She managed to make the words sound natural, as though she were not hearing the uneasiness built up in his mind.

‹ _Do not worry,_ › she said to him privately. ‹ _They are your brothers, and they love you as you do them._ ›

Maitimo huffed a sigh. Their love was not what he doubted; Makalaurë's forgiveness was. But he remained complacent in her arms, though he looked back to make sure Findekáno had not fled. He had not; he held himself a distance from the others, but he did not look uncomfortable or sad. Nerdanel approached him to give a hug, as though the rift between Fëanáro and Nolofinwë had never come between them, and he did not act surprised. Maitimo found himself caught betwen them, but not uncomfortably squeezed, and he purred until Findekáno moved away to find shelter for his horse.

After that, everything became a whirl. There was a feast, as there had been for Irissë and Lómion, and this time there were others here with the sturdy look of Mahtan's folk. They smiled easily at Nerdanel and Ambarussa, politely at Carnistir and Makalaurë. Makalaurë played the harp after the feast, as the strangers took their leave, and Maitimo relaxed slightly; at least his brother had not lost enjoyment in music. The tune was a melancholy one, but not a hopeless one.

As the moon rose, Nerdanel whispered in Maitimo's mind, ‹ _I would send each of the boys to have time alone with you, if you will allow it. You are their brother; they deserve a chance to speak to you, if they will._ ›

Maitimo sat up; he had been dozing. ‹ _I would speak with Carnistir first, if he will see me,_ › he said. Nerdanel's eyes widened, but she nodded before rising to her feet. Maitimo followed her to a lounging area surrounded by gauzy fabrics stirred by the cool night breeze and jumped up on a chair with a lush cushion that he sank into.

Nerdanel left, and after a while, Carnistir stalked into the area and sat down on the edge of one of the other chairs. He scowled and crossed his arms over his chest. ‹ _What do you want from me?_ › he asked, and even in ósanwe his voice echoed loud enough to make Maitimo's head hurt.

‹ _I want for you to know that my decisions were my own,_ › Maitimo said firmly. ‹ _I have taken responsibility for them, and you must not think I remember you with anger._ ›

Carnistir frowned at him for a moment, then snorted as his shoulders relaxed. Some of the tension in his face eased, making him look near as young as Makalaurë's new body. ‹ _Do you ever feel anger outside of battle?_ › he demanded. ‹ _You have a heart of stone, and by this do I know you are truly my brother._ ›

Maitimo's tail lashed, all the more strongly for the claim that he could not feel. ‹ _Not all of us are as quick to anger as you, brother,_ › he said. ‹ _Indeed, few are, and I would count your deeds among the most reckless for it. But you are my brother, and you have made your penance, as I can clearly see from your new body. I would not withhold my love from you simply for showing me my weaknesses._ ›

Carnistir was silent for a moment, and Maitimo blinked. In the past, Carnistir would have moved already to even louder yelling, and Maitimo had been braced for that, along with the possibility of his brother storming off. "Fuck," Carnistir spat aloud instead, not in Quenya. Maitimo twitched. "I can't say this with ósanwe. I'm… sorry." His throat worked as he swallowed. "To goad you forward with the thought that you might one day see Findekáno again was cruelty and… Mother tells that you are mortal like this." He hung his head, and Maitimo could smell upon him a grief truer than he'd ever known from Carnistir. "If I was to be reembodied, so too should you have been, for you were always the kindest of us. I despaired of that, ere I was killed and saw the truth of it."

Maitimo stayed silent, unsure of what to say or do, until Carnistir heaved a mighty sigh. "You are my brother," he muttered, "and I never imagined that you might one day be lost to us forever."

Maitimo sighed as well and hopped off of the chair. He leaned against Carnistir's leg and remembered a great many moments until Carnistir lurched to his feet with less grace than might be expected from an Elf. "I'll send in Makalaurë," he muttered.

The thought of Makalaurë walking through the doorway made Maitimo's tail twitch, and he stepped on it with as much force as possible in an attempt to hide those conflicted emotions. He waited the faint sounds of the harp stopped, then sat up straighter as he listened for the sound of approaching footsteps. Makalaurë entered the room with his expression still undecipherable, and Maitimo could not sniff him out. He could not apologize without ósanwe, though, and he could not initiate it, so he simply waited there, silent, hoping that his brother would begin to speak.

He did not. The silence stretched, until it sung with the tension of an unplucked string. Maitimo's tail lashed free of its prison under his paw. He kept staring at Makalaurë, waiting for him to say something, anything.

Finally, after far too long, Makalaurë sat down. "It was the wrong decision," he said. "You made the worst of all decisions. But I do not blame you for this; you are my brother, and before then you had always been the most reasonable. If we had more time, I would perhaps have held longer onto this knowledge, until you had come to me yourself. But I am told you cannot, so instead you will listen to me before we truly speak. You made the wrong decision, and you then left me alone, and for too long I could not even think for the pain. When I finally saw that only your path would lead to freedom, I took it."

Maitimo had suspected as much, but the words hurt to hear. He lowered his front half to the ground and forced himself to give Makalaurë the attention he deserved.

"If you had listened to me," Makalaurë said softly, "we would not have needed to die. That is what I thought. But coming here and regaining my memories fresh out of childhood, I wonder if perhaps you were not also right. They surely would not have granted us forgiveness so easily; we would not have been allowed to live in Valinor as I do now. You feared the dark and the prison we had called upon ourselves, once, and I believe now that we both were right. It may be that by giving up the Silmarils in truth once we had fulfilled our oath, I am now able to live like this, and you… you are suffering enough."

He reached out his hand and settled it on Maitimo's head. Maitimo startled and leaned up into the touch.

"You are my brother, Maedhros. Maitimo. I have always loved you, and I always will. I do not believe either of us were in a state for proper thought at that point so long ago; we should have realised the Silmarils were not meant for our hands and yet neither of us did. The oath is filled and long over, and you have bought freedom for all of us at a high cost. I will remember you."

Those words, coming from one who had made it his life's work to sing, might have brought tears to Maitimo's eyes had he still been in a form to remember the feel of them. Instead, he relaxed his whole body, and that was when Makalaurë smiled and began the ósanwe.

‹ _Now then, what have you to say to me in return, brother?_ › he asked. No matter that he had forgiven Maitimo so beautifully; Maitimo suspected a bit of trickery and revenge to be part of his schemes.

‹ _I would say that I am sorry,_ › Maitimo said immediately. ‹ _I would apologize for everything; I had always intended to, but I would not approach you so callously when memory of my final mistakes lingered so. You had the children to think of; and they should be more important than a broken oath. I should have made my decision alone, but I could not see that; I could not see beyond my own fear._ ›

‹ _And I not beyond my own weariness,_ › Makalaurë agreed. ‹ _I do not think there was a path out of suffering by then. You would have been a fool to seek the Silmaril on your own._ ›

It was in Maitimo's thoughts to admit that he had imagined the darkness of the Valar's prison to be a place not unlike Thangorodrim, a haze of pain and darkness and loneliness in which all memory of self had fled without familiar voices to call it back. All his hope that the suffering might one day end had flown away well before the end of the first year. But to say so now felt cruel, and might remind Makalaurë of the fact that he had not risen up against Morgoth to rescue Maitimo, though Maitimo well understood his reasons. He had always understood; for he himself had sprung the initial trap, even knowing it was there, and he had not been able to save himself. Why should his brothers have done any better?

With those dark thoughts and memories in his head, kept carefully out of the ósanwe, he pressed his head to Makalaurë's hand and felt affection move through the bleakness of his mood. ‹ _Yes,_ › he agreed quietly. ‹ _I do not think there was a path out._ ›

Makalaurë bowed his head, and the two of them sat quietly with one another. Maitimo was not sure there was anything else they needed to say.

* * *

His meetings with Ambarussa were more casual affairs, and Nerdanel visited last to ask how he was doing and to smile down at him with a gentle fondness he barely remembered. She had prepared the same room as before for Findekáno and Maitimo, and Findekáno stared at it for long moment before he lay down on his stomach with a deep and heartfelt noise made up of an incomprehensible mush of syllables. Maitimo walked over to him and crawled onto his back, walking to the small of it and curling up, so as to force Findekáno to open an ósanwe connection if he wished Maitimo to move.

Maitimo could feel muscles shift under him. "Hrrg," Findekáno said, his voice muddled in the sheets. Maitimo began kneading his back without conscious thought. He paused as he realised what was happening, then continued, slowly and more careful to keep his claws retracted.

‹ _You spoil me, Maitimo,_ › Findekáno said finally.

‹ _Do you not realise this is something I also enjoy?_ › Maitimo asked. ‹ _This hröa finds comfort in it._ ›

‹ _Just the hröa?_ › Findekáno sounded amused, and he reached around behind himself to pat awkwardly at Maitimo's side. ‹ _So you wouldn't enjoy touching me at all if you were in your own body?_ ›

Maitimo kneaded a little harder. ‹ _I would enjoy a great many things if I were back in my former body,_ › he replied. He thought longingly of how it had seemed when he had newly lost his hand, as though the world had been cut off from him and all his former enjoyments gone. How foolish he had been; he had won those enjoyments back with sweat and blood and hard work. No amount of such this time would restore him to what he once was.

Findekáno shifted and drew up his arms to rest the side of his head on them. ‹ _I meant it as a gentle tease, not as a gateway to melancholy,_ › he said. ‹ _You were not so before; you had fire. What happened, Maitimo? Talk to me, please._ ›

Maitimo hesitated, but not long. ‹ _If I indeed had fire, I burned it all out upon my death,_ › he said, ‹ _that I would not linger like my father, as a blaze of defiance in a place where there can be none. Grief is all that was left, for a very long time, and it is only now that I begin to recall more of my old self. But even as I recall it, I cannot change what I have become and how short a span I have left._ ›

Findekáno made a soft noise and turned his head away so that Maitimo could no longer see his face. ‹ _You say it so easily. I still do not want to accept it; for I would have you in any form I could, for however long I could. To never see you again, Maitimo… I do not know if I can do it. I might lay down as your grandmother once did, if it would grant me more time with you._ ›

‹ _You could not._ › Maitimo was certain of that, at least. ‹ _You have too much life; you would not know how to give it up as she did. Findekáno…_ ›

Findekáno made a noise into his arms. ‹ _If you were not so small, I would roll over that I might hold you,_ › he said. ‹ _Will you move so that I may do so without crushing you?_ Maitimo did, and he found himself wrapped in Findekáno's long arms, held tenderly but securely. They stayed that way for a long time, with the moon moving through the sky as they did. Maitimo could feel sleep creeping upon him, but he wished to stay awake for this, to remember the feel of Findekáno's embrace and the way he smelled, and so he did not let dreams take him.

‹ _We have years yet,_ › he said, well aware of how short a time that was.

‹ _Less than a century,_ Findekáno countered. ‹ _Less than half a century. Less than a quarter of a century. That is not time enough, Maitimo. A lifetime together would not be time enough for me; we have squandered all of it for others._ › He sat up and buried his face in Maitimo's fur. ‹ _In my youth, I believed I would marry you when I grew old enough. Then I grew enough to realise how others would frown upon this union with my cousin, and I let this stop me from pursuing you in truth._ ›

‹ _Findekáno,_ › Maitimo said helplessly, unsure whether he wished for Findekáno to stop or to continue.

‹ _No; listen. I know you felt it, too, for many a time I caught you looking as well. And I thought, it is all very well, we shall have plenty of time to convince the others._ ›

Maitimo knew well what came next. He put a paw on Findekáno's chest, directly over his heart, and felt the steady beat of it through Findekáno's clothes.

‹ _We did not have enough time,_ › Findekáno said. ‹ _We did not have much time at all. And though we may never be married, I would have you know that you are the only person I ever wished it from. I saw none other the same, not even during those long stretches where you were lost to me; on the other side of the world, it seemed._ ›

‹ _I have done you great wrong,_ › Maitimo said. ‹ _If I could take away your love, if I could petition the Valar to do so at the end of my time—_ ›

‹ _No!_ › Findekáno said sharply. ‹ _They cannot take this from me. If I must live with the grief, then I will live with it. I will pray to Nienna if I must, some day far in the future. But I will not have these feelings for you drawn so easily from me; they have been a part of me all my life, and to remove them would be to cut out a portion of my still-beating heart._ ›

Maitimo knew not what to say to that. He stayed there, silent and uncertain, and felt the undeniable truth of Findekáno's words echo through his fëa.

‹ _I love you, Maitimo. Were you an Elf again, I would marry you, if you would have me. I care not what others think anymore. Would you have agreed?_ ›

‹ _Yes,_ › Maitimo managed. ‹ _Of course I would, Findekáno; who would not take you into their heart, when you are so brave and strong, so full of everything that life is? Once, you saved my life upon Thangorodrim, but many a time have you saved my hope with your smile or your courage. I know who I would be without you, and that is the person who burned himself and caused grief to so many. I have no wish to be that person again._ ›

‹ _A fine pair we are,_ › Findekáno said quietly, brushing his hands over Maitimo's spine. ‹ _I would stay with you as long as you have form in Valinor, at the least. Tell me you will permit this._ ›

‹ _That is what I have been insisting upon this whole time,_ › Maitimo replied. He leaned forward and tucked his head against Findekáno's neck, but he did not purr. He simply rested there, taking in what Findekáno would allow him, letting himself mourn quietly for a future that would never be.

* * *

The years passed slower for Maitimo than they did for Findekáno. Findekáno's knowledge of the passage of time was still an Elf's, while Maitimo settled into his new hröa and felt a strange lengthening of the days. He slept, though, and he slept frequently; this bothered him, for he had no wish to sleep away his limited time with Findekáno and his family. Within a year, perhaps sensing Maitimo's frustration, Findekáno moved to Nerdanel's hall. Maitimo might have been mortified had he not been so grateful that he would not be forced to choose.

It made sense, he told himself. Maitimo's life would be little more than a long vacation to everyone else. But the thought that he did not deserve any of this still burrowed uncomfortably in Maitimo's heart. He deserved none of it: not the small house where he and Findekáno slept, not the mortal lifespan that would burn out shortly, like his father's too-bright flame.

‹ _What's wrong?_ Findekáno asked, stroking Maitimo's side gently. Maitimo shook his head; he couldn't lie through ósanwe, but neither did he have any desire to tell Findekáno the truth. So he lay there and let his heart hurt until Findekáno's hands soothed him enough to move, and then he caught sight of Findekáno's gorgeous smile, undiminished by all of this.

‹ _I love you,_ › Maitimo said, and the corners of Findekáno's eyes crinkled up as his smile threatened to take over his entire face. He leaned down to press a kiss to the top of Maitimo's head.

Maitimo suspected moments like this were gathered carefully and stored away in Findekáno's memory, as they were his own, with a different purpose. But he did not ask, and Findekáno's cheer never echoed false through ósanwe.

* * *

But Maitimo died. It was an inevitability, with his mortal hröa, that he would one day find himself back at the Halls of Mandos. He supposed that now he would discover, as Lúthien once had, what fate awaited the souls of mortals. But his fëa seemed not to have been shaped by its brief time as a cat; he awoke from what had been a peaceful sleep in a frail body to find himself the fëa he had always been.

Nienna greeted him as he took in his once-familiar surroundings. "Do you grieve?" she asked, her voice thick.

Maitimo had not seen her for a very long time, and she had never spoken to him personally before this. He nodded warily, confused but honest. She did not look like Námo her brother, more formless then even he and with the look of one melting from free-floating eyes that were only sockets. She had her hood back; perhaps that was the difference.

"Then weep," she said, her voice gentle. "Weep as I do, and learn to draw out your grief so that you may let it go."

Maitimo bowed his head and did. His fëa shed a cat's brief sixteen years worth of grief; his life had been shorter even than he had guessed, as the body had been full-grown by the time of his arrival in it. He wept for Findekáno and his family and the grief his death would cause them in turn— in the end, he had not been given that final opportunity to say goodbye.

He found that once he had stopped weeping for his brief life and those he had left behind, other images came to his mind;, of his burnt palm, blackened by the Silmaril and his own cruel misdeeds; of bodies lying with eyes wide and anguished, sent back to Valinor violently and too early; of those woods he had searched through endlessly, only to find no sign of the children, of whether they were dead already or slowly starving, trapped somewhere without the ability to fend for themselves.

He cried for the battle he alone had misjudged and had lost Findekáno in. The High Kingship had not been the same without Nolofinwë and his son upon the throne; they were Elves Maitimo had always trusted with life and limb and happiness. He cried for his mother and father's final argument, for Ambarussa the younger's death and the elder's stony silence.

When he finished, he knew not how much time had passed, but Nienna leaned forward over him and let a single phosphorescent tear drip down upon his face. He looked up to greet it and felt something strange shiver through his fëa. Nienna vanished, leaving behind only the familiar shadows of the Hall.

Námo appeared, then, and reached out a hand. "Let me see you, Maitimo, son of Fëanáro the Unforgiven," he boomed, and Maitimo stepped forward against his will. He felt tired. His spirit legs trembled like a newborn foal. "You are finally healing," he said, and Maitimo frowned to hear some satisfaction in that voice.

"What you did to me was cruel," he said, "and I could believe that I deserved it, were it not for the other brothers you yet grant reembodiment or the chance for it."

Námo was silent for a moment. "What believe you your brothers have done, that they are not housed temporarily in the body of an animal?" he asked, and his voice had quieted.

Maitimo shook his head. "I thought about it much during these past sixteen years. Ambarussa the elder is perhaps the easiest, for his actions were worsened by the grief of losing his twin and his other half, and he could in that manner be forgiven what he did."

"And you do not think the same of yourself?"

He hesitated. "It must be, for you have treated us differently. Perhaps it is that Ambarussa were born together."

"If not for your differing treatment," Námo said with a sigh that echoed off the walls, "what would you think?"

Maitimo's mouth twisted. "I would think to follow my brothers into reembodiment, though it might take longer for sins as heavy as mine; for I have regretted them for two Ages and more and know not how to further repent."

Námo's deep violet eyes— all color, with no pupil— regarded him from the shadows of his hood. "You know not so much about death as you believe yourself to know, Elf." There was no malice in his words, only a weariness that Maitimo believed he could recognize as the weariness of one grown tired of another's way of looking at the world. "You believe you were sent back as a punishment, as a cat in truth. Tell me, Maitimo: do cats have fëar?"

"They do not normally have fëar," Maitimo said. "But in this case, the cat's body housed mine."

Námo nodded. "And do you believe this body was your own?"

Maitimo stopped and frowned. "You mean to say that I was not reembodied, as I had believed," he said slowly.

"Yes," Námo said. "Your situation was unique. Two Ages had gone by, and your victims have grieved and lived anew. It is not they who could not forgive; it was yourself."

"Myself," Maitimo repeated slowly, his mind whirling as he tried to fit this new information onto all that he knew. "But then—"

"It is as you suspect. Your repentance kept you trapped here. I have no wish for you to remain here when this should instead be a haven for Men; they will die and grow in number. Your animal form was my sister's doing, so that I might remove you from these Halls more permanently." Námo fell silent for a moment, but Maitimo could think of nothing to say. "You shall be reembodied shortly, but not right away. I must gather my energy."

Maitimo nodded. Námo vanished, and Maitimo let his fëa rest for a moment before moving towards his fathers and brothers. A fëa had no sense of direction, but he knew them well by their souls and could follow that feeling.

It had been too long since he had seen his father, wearied by his own guilt as he had been. But Námo's words and the feeling of Nerdanel's arms around him gave him the strength to move closer to the fëar that flickered and blurred like firelight. Tyelkormo and Curufinwë were there, of course, though Curufinwë had not his usual aspect; he looked tired to Maitimo's eyes.

Maitimo wondered if this was a sign that he would be reembodied soon. Perhaps he would choose a new name when he did.

"Greetings, father," Maitimo said softly.

Fëanáro's eyes, at least, were gentle. "Nelyo," he said, and he reached out. Fëar could not touch in the same manner as bodies, but Maitimo reached out in response so that the faint, indistinct feeling of fëa against fëa could be felt. "You have been gone."

His voice did not come out in anger or accusation, as it once would have, and Maitimo closed his eyes. Had this happened in his absence? Had he not seen this? Had he deliberately ignored his father's fiery soul calming in the Ages in which Maitimo had been locked in place by his own grief and self-blame? Fire still remained, but it was a tempered fire, now. "Father," he said. "I wish to say my farewells now, for I know not when I am to be reembodied in truth."

Fëanáro frowned. "You say this as though you have been reembodied falsely. Do the Valar use you for their games? Do not listen to their false promises, Nelyo; they will only hurt you."

Maitimo sighed. Here, he reminded himself, Fëanáro had no torch, no ships to burn. He could not set alight anything in his anger. Fëanáro had no power here that Maitimo would not allow him; they were equals, as much as they could ever be. Maitimo glanced over at Tyelkormo, who rolled his eyes up to the top of the Halls.

"If you believe that, you may be here for even longer," Maitimo said. "You must recognize your own part in their actions, at least." He shook his head. "I have met Ambarussa."

Fëanáro's eyes widened, but he said nothing, and Maitimo found himself in the peculiar position of facing down a man he had once cherished and respected as his father, who he could no longer predict. Fëanáro was afire, but he was as the last dying flames of a firepit, with no fuel to replenish the life he had once held. Maitimo had expected to find him intimidating or angry; instead, facing down his fëa, Maitimo felt only sadness. "Umbarto," Fëanáro said finally, instead of Ambarto, and gone were the impassioned speeches that had stirred Maitimo's heart many Ages ago.

"Ambarto," Maitimo corrected gently; Ambarto was the name Fëanáro himself had chosen. "He is happy, Father. He lives, and he is happy."

"He would not see me in the Halls," Fëanáro murmured, "as any faithful son should do." But there was no bite to his words, and even Tyelkormo, who Maitimo had rarely seen express empathy, shifted uncomfortably.

"You killed him," Maitimo said. "If you will not listen to the Valar, listen to me. His death is your fault, and you must accept that responsibility before you leave these Halls." He glanced at Tyelkormo and Curufinwë. "I hope that this is not a permanent farewell."

Curufinwë smiled lopsidedly at him, and Maitimo left feeling lighter.

* * *

He did not return to see Fëanáro, but Curufinwë left their father's side to approach him some time later. "I did not want to admit that Father was in the wrong," he admitted, the words leaving him as though forced out, "for we share a name, and to admit that Father was wrong would be as admitting that so, too, was I." He looked at Maitimo squarely. "But he is not me, and I have made my own wrongs, have I not?"

"We all have," Maitimo agreed, "though mine outnumber even yours."

"No," Curufinwë said, shaking his head. "For you tried many years longer to prevent this. I pursued the Silmarils with more doggedness. But I knew as soon as I saw your fëa; for although there are no bodies in this place, you bear the burned mark upon your hand." His mouth twisted. "We were never meant to hold the Silmarils. Such a fact is difficult to accept. I told myself at first that you had done something, you yourself—"

"All of us," Maitimo murmured.

"—but I am your brother, and I know you, Maitimo. You would not do anything that we would not, for purposes of claiming the Silmarils." Curufinwë folded his arms over his chest. "Long did you detain us from that very purpose."

Maitimo looked down at his burnt hand. As the cat, his paws had all been flawlessly intact and pain-free; as a fëa, it did not hurt, but the mark sat there still, perfectly shaped to remind all of his failings. "And if you speak truly, it is only that I have done these things while your bodies lay dead and your fëar long escaped to the Halls of Mandos," Maitimo said finally. "It does not excuse me or absolve me; though the Valar have said that I dwelt too long in guilt and repentance and must now forgive myself."

Curufinwë snorted. "Of course you would do that to yourself," he scoffed, but his face had softened somewhat, and Maitimo thought he could see some relief in Curufinwë's face. "It is everyone else who must repent of our deeds, for we have too much pride to admit wrongdoing."

"I am glad you know it, brother," Maitimo murmured, wishing that he could draw Curufinwë to him. It had been long since he touched this brother. Curufinwë was too much a reminder of Fëanáro in aspect and spirit in life, and the more Maitimo realised just how far their father's oath had condemned them, the less comfort he had held in the face of Curufinwë's brash confidence. "I would like your reembodiment to happen soon, for we have much to catch up on."

Curufinwë made a gesture as though he were going to clap Maitimo on the shoulder but could not connect. "I will speak further to Tyelkormo and Father," he said, his voice quiet. "They grow weary of this as well, and though I know not who Father will be once he is reembodied, I wish for it to happen."

"Finwë will surely help as well," Maitimo murmured, and then Curufinwë was gone. Maitimo was alone in the Halls of Mandos once more.

* * *

He did not know how long it was until Námo had the energy to reembody him. He did not have the means to track the days, and Lómion no longer wandered the Halls. Maitimo thought briefly of seeking out Ëol after his discussion with Curufinwë, but he had no wish to further interfere in the affairs of Irissë and Lómion, and both had been content without him. Instead, he looked at the tapestries and traced his insubstantial fingers over all the acts of the Ages he had missed. He had missed the end of Sauron, brought about by a new race of heroes capable of resisting his lingering evil and bringing him to his final end.

Maitimo found a different sort of joy whenever he saw Galadriel among the weavings. His littlest cousin had not returned to Valinor at the end of the First Age, but had instead stayed in Beleriand-which-was-no-more and had made a home for herself. She was, by all accounts, a quiet leader but capable of protecting her people from any danger that might arise.

Maitimo wondered when she had grown so much stronger than he. Perhaps she always had been; she had seen what grew in Fëanáro's mind before any of them, after all, and looking back upon it her disdain seemed uncomfortably prophetic.

He traced her calm smile and the humorous glint in her eyes as she spoke to the Maiar, and he thought wistfully of what might have been. What might still be, he reminded himself, and when he was done gazing at Galadriel's tapestries he went to the tapestries of the Khazâd to see what had become of them.

Námo finally appeared before Maitimo again in the small segment of the Halls that belonged to Maitimo's life. He had been gazing at his own tapestries and trying to decipher all the emotions within him, but when Námo appeared he turned and smiled. "Is it time?" he asked, hope rising in him.

"It is," Námo said, and Maitimo knew no more.

* * *

Maitimo came to the realisation early in life that he must have been reembodied. It was not that his parents did not treat him with the love that parents ought to, as though he were his own person; it was that no other Elves save for Maitimo's own older brother had their skin marred so by a strange blackened shape. The mark was hideous, and Maitimo hated it as much as he hated the way his other hand could not function properly. For an embarrassing number of years, he had burst easily into tears over his own physical limitations and markings, had felt anger at the mockery that was his mother-name. His mother had always pulled him close during those outbursts and assured him that he was lovely to any mother, and to more besides.

His sister, a mere twenty years older than he, was entirely unmarked. She would be counted a beauty by any, with her red hair the same shade as Maitimo's, and the words would not be only offered soothingly by their mother. She had the full use of both hands, and she used them well in her bowmanship and hunting. Maitimo might have resented her if not for the fact that she took joy in his presence and often brought him on adventures.

Maitimo's father grew steadily more affectionate as Maitimo aged. He shied from the black mark at first, but when Maitimo's mother scolded him, he took to stroking his thumb over the mark. Maitimo had never asked, but he came to believe that it had started as a means of reassuring himself, though as Maitimo grew it became a gesture of genuine affection and soothed Maitimo's outbursts easily.

He could have asked any of them: his kind mother, his welcoming sister, his loving father. But it was to Maitimo's brother, elder than Maitimo by seventy-four years and another bearer of the black mark, that Maitimo confessed his thoughts to. "I know I am not myself, and I know you are not yourself," Maitimo whispered one night, out in the forest so that the rest of the family would not overhear them. "We share this mark; we must have known one another in our past life."

Makalaurë did not answer right away, as he had out his harp and was staring into the distance as Maitimo talked. But when Maitimo tugged on his arm, he did turn with a sigh. "You were my brother then, as you are now," he said. "Why must you do this to yourself? Enjoy this life while you do not remember the last. You need not punish yourself further."

"It is not punishment," Maitimo insisted, but with a guilty start; Makalaurë, as usual, was right. "I wish to know what to expect, that is all."

Makalaurë played a small, rippling scale. "You should expect two families," he said. "Even our sister will have two families soon enough. But you have at least twenty years yet to wait; have patience. When you do remember, you will never know this innocence again."

And well Maitimo knew it; from his earliest memories, Makalaurë had ben quiet and withdraw, weighed down by his memories. He would play with his siblings, but there was always a touch of melancholy when he did. "Is it not the same?" Maitimo countered brashly nonetheless. "I already know that remembering will make me as you are. What will change if you tell me why?"

Makalaurë reached over to put his marked hand on top of Maitimo's head. "It is strange, to be the elder of us," he said. "But this time, you shall have to trust me. I will tell you no more, save that you are not the only one who inquires repeatedly as to the state of your memories. You must both be patient; your time shall come soon enough." No more would he say upon the subject.

But Maitimo recalled those words in their sister's fiftieth year, when his sister awoke with her fierce smile changed to something shocked and cold. She had made plans with Maitimo to search for inspiration, that he might make his mother a present, but instead she vanished. He was forced to take a much unhappier trip himself. If his sister, who bore no strange mark and suffered no physical ailment, could be so upset by her memories, perhaps Makalaurë was right: Maitimo had no wish to regain them.

* * *

Maitimo approached his own fiftieth year with dread and anticipation both. He did not rest well for the first few nights, for he remembered that the memories were regained through dreams. Eventually, however, he did sleep, at his mother's behest. He woke no longer simply Maitimo, son of Findaráto and Amarië, but Maitimo, son of Findaráto and Fëanáro, of Amarië and Nerdanel, shaped irrevocably by both experiences.

Makalaurë's words those twenty-odd years ago had prepared Maitimo for sorrow beyond the telling of it, but Maitimo-of-the-past had grown used to his grief. He felt no urge to vanish, as his sister had. Instead, he found that his younger self had been correct; the knowledge filled him with a sense of rightness and empowerment, and he went into the kitchen after only a moment of hesitation so that he might approach his new father. "How strange it must feel, to raise two of your cousins as your own children."

Findaráto startled, then turned and laughed. "Oh, you have remembered. I can no longer see you as my eldest cousin, however," he admitted. "You are my son, as is Makalaurë, though you may have the memories of my cousin." He shook his head. "And soon enough, I imagine, I shall lose you to he who is still my cousin."

Maitimo could not deny that some of his first thoughts had been of Findekáno, of what his life was now and whether he had found someone new. He did not know how long it had been since Rúnyo's death and the birth of a new Maitimo.

As if guessing his thoughts, Findaráto sighed and gave Maitimo a stern look. "Makalaurë has stayed at home longer since your sister's birth and yours, but he still travels to see the others. Undoubtedly, he has told them. I am surprised you have not run off already."

"I would not know where to find them, even if I did," Maitimo admitted. He sat down at the table, hesitating for a moment before leaning forward to press his face to his father's shoulder as he had always done. "My… my mother." He stumbled over the words and frowned. "My first mother would be at her new home, likely with the twins, but the others stay with their new families as well."

Unexpectedly, Amarië was the one who laughed as she came in through the other doorway. "Have I raised a coward?" she teased, and Maitimo found himself struck for a moment by double vision, of the Amarië who had saved Rúnyo's life as a stranger and the one he knew now as his second mother. "Your father warned me long ago that this day would come. At least you do us the courtesy of coming to say goodbye first. Neither of your siblings did."

She leaned over him and pressed a kiss into his hair. Maitimo blinked. "I thank you for your kindness," he said awkwardly, staring at his hands.

That earned him a laugh. "We did only what any parents would do, love."

Amarië gave him directions to Nerdanel's home while Findaráto slipped into the kitchen to return with a pack of food. "It is what we would have done for your siblings, as well, had they waited," she said with a smile. "Travel safely, and come back to us."

Findaráto leaned in with a level stare and pointed a finger in Maitimo's face. "Do not believe that you may get married right away simply because you remember being my cousin," he said sternly. "You shall wait until you are an appropriate age."

Maitimo shook his head, unwilling to hear his cousin-turned-father speak on the subject when Maitimo himself was still caught in a swirl of uncertain emotions. He had forgotten Findekáno for fifty years; who knew what changes those fifty years might have brought for both of them.

* * *

The journey gave Maitimo some much-needed familiarity as well as some peace. Each touch of his foot against the ground centered him further. This was his body. He was only himself, through both lives. His brothers had managed it; he would as well. He only slowed when he came within sight of Tirion, for it came to him that he could seek out Findekáno first. But he looked down at the mark upon his hand, his sin which had not been overwritten in his new life, and he dismissed the thought.

He traveled at a pace all his own, not fast and not slow, but he found himself outside of his mother's hall ere long, and the same hesitation which had gripped him as a cat seized him again. He had said his goodbyes, here; would he still be welcome when he proved those false?

A shout from behind startled him, but he had not the time to turn around before the weight of a full-grown Elf crashed into his back and wrapped arms around his front. "Ambarussa, it's Maitimo!" the weight yelled, and Maitimo found himself both elated and disappointed to realise that it was his youngest brother, now the oldest of all of them. He turned in Ambarussa's arms to face both the twins and return the fierce hug before it could be broken.

"Hello," he said softly.

Ambarussa the elder embraced him as well, and there was a wicked curve to his smile that Maitimo found charmingly familiar, for all that it had never been seen in Beleriand. "Mother is going to cry," he said, but both twins leaned on Maitimo, one on either side to prevent him from running. "You are tall even this young! That is hardly fair; I thought we might have the advantage for once."

They found Nerdanel inside one of the buildings with Carnistir, who was scowling at a small statue, his arms folded over his chest as she talked. "Mother!" Ambarussa the younger called, but said nothing more. Nerdanel turned to face the three of them and gasped. Carnistir's own eyes went wide, but Nerdanel recovered swiftly enough to stride over and take Maitimo in a tight embrace.

"We had word from Makalaurë, but I dared not hope," she whispered. "The Valar have been kind to us." She looked up at him, her smile and eyes bright. "I did wonder when Makalaurë decided once again to set up residence here with us."

Carnistir did not move forward; he nodded stiffly instead. The old Maitimo would have let him keep his distance, but the new, younger Maitimo had relearned the value of touch, first as a cat and then as a child. He stepped over to initiate the hug himself. There was red in Carnistir's cheeks when he pulled back, but he looked more peaceful than Maitimo had seen him even before they had left for Beleriand.

"How long was it between Rúnyo's death and my reembodiment?" Maitimo asked Nerdanel quietly as she grasped his wrist and tugged him outside again, towards a different building.

"Four years had passed before Makalaurë returned to tell us of his new baby brother, born with a head of copper hair and a black mark upon his palm," she said. "Even if Amarië had chosen a different name, we would have known the child to be you. She has raised two of my sons for me; now that you are grown, I must thank her properly." They came to a room with a closed door, and Nerdanel stopped. Confused, Maitimo followed her lead, and she turned to smile at him. "Fear you to go into that room?"

"Should I?" Maitimo asked with a frown. Nerdanel shook her head and raised a finger to her lips moments before the door flung itself open with a shout; Maitimo found himself yet again staggering under the weight of a grown Elf. He stared down at tightly braided black hair threaded through with gold, at brown skin exposed by the parting of those braids. "Findekáno? You have not returned to the house of your father?"

When Findekáno only responded with a wild laugh and a tightening of his embrace, Maitimo looked over to his mother to find a richly amused smile on her face. "He has long returned," she answered for him. "He arrived here with Makalaurë to await your arrival."

‹ _My beloved Maitimo,_ › Findekáno said, and his ósanwe was as familiar as the scent of him. Maitimo rested his cheek against the top of Findekáno's hair and relaxed into the touch. ‹ _I have waited half a century, but you must realise now that you are not escaping this a bachelor, for I have been seeking tutelage that I might forge our engagement rings before you came of age._ ›

Maitimo found himself startled into a laugh. ‹ _Of course I will marry you,_ › he said. "But now that we must not speak so silently, think you it is not rude to have such a conversation in front of my mother?"

Findekáno pulled back just enough that Maitimo could see a fierce glint in his eyes before he pulled Maitimo down for a too-brief kiss. "What, and let you reject me out of embarrassment because you could not say such a thing in front of your mother?" he asked, and he beamed over at Nerdanel. "I can think of many uses for ósanwe."

Maitimo felt his face heat. "Findekáno," he chided, "I am yet fifty." Findekáno threw back his head and laughed before tugging Maitimo down into another kiss, this one longer and more exploratory. Findekáno's tongue slid warm and wet into Maitimo's mouth.

He'd forgotten his mother's presence until he felt her hand at his back. "When you have reacquainted yourselves, do come to the main house again," she said. "There will be plenty of food, and this is a time for all family to be together."

"Yes," Maitimo agreed, panting slightly as he pulled his mouth away from Findekáno's. "There is plenty of time for everything else."

**Author's Note:**

>  **Archive Warnings** : This story contains no rape/non-con and no graphic depictions of violence, though it does contain the killing and messy consumption of small animals— nothing more graphic than you might see in a nature documentary. There is also a lot of death, as this story deals with characters dead in canon being reembodied. There is an onscreen death of a major character that is believed to be permanent at first. It’s not. No death in this fic is permanent.
> 
> \--
> 
> Thank you so much to everyone who read this hugely self-indulgent fic! True story, this happened entirely because I decided I wanted to write animal transformation and it exploded a bit into forgiveness/rebirth themes. Oops? I had fun, anyway.
> 
> I want to thank [Eldritch](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Eldritch) for her work typo-spotting, doing basic continuity checks, and cheerleading, even when she has not read a word of The Silmarillion herself (yet) just because she is that amazing a friend. All remaining errors are entirely mine, of course.
> 
> And finally, though Rúnyo is marked as a series, this is really it for the main story. However, there are a few scenes that I couldn't get to fit in the context of the narrative that I do want to write up at some vague point in the future and add to the series page, the most notable being Maitimo and Tyelkormo _actually_ talking.


End file.
